THE   SPELL  OF   EGYPT 


THE  SPELL  OF  EGYPT 


BY 


ROBERT  HICHENS 

AUTHOR    OF    «'  THE    GARDEN    OF    ALLAH,"   ETC. 


NEW  YORK 

THE   CENTURY  CO. 
1911 


First  Edition  issued  under  the  title 
of  "Egypt  and  Its  Monuments.*' 
Illustrated  by  Jules  Gufrin. 


Copyright,  1908,  by 
THE  CENTURY  Co. 


SRLF 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 
I 

THE;  PYRAMIDS     .  i 


II 

SPHINX ,          13 

III 
SAKKARA 25 

IV 
ABYDOS         ........          35 


vi  CONTENTS 

PAGE 

V 

THE  NILE   .....  i      ;.i       :.i       •  45 

VI 

DENDERAH         ....       ...      ..,      .         53 

VII 
KARNAK      .....       i.j      m      [•>         6? 

VIII 
LUXOR          .....  .       .1       •       •         89 

IX 

COLOSSI  OF  MEMNON         ....       IO5 


X 

MEDINET-ABU          .        . 


CONTENTS  vii 

PAGE 
XI 

THE  RAMESSEUM  .       .       .       .,     _.       .       131 


XII 

DEIR-EL-BAHARI     .        .        .       .       .       .       145 

XIII 
THE  TOMBS  OF  THE  KINGS   .       .       .       l6l 

XIV 
EDFU      ......  ..,.:.       169 

XV 
ROM  OMBOS  .,       .       .,       .       189 


XVI 

2O3 


viii  CONTENTS 


PAGE 
XVII 


PHARAOH'S  BED  " 217 


XVIII 

OLD   CAIRO 239 


THE  PYRAMIDS 


THE  PYRAMIDS 

WHY  do  you  come  to  Egypt?  Do  you 
come  to  gain  a  dream,  or  to  regain  lost 
dreams  of  old;  to  gild  your  life  with 
the  drowsy  gold  of  romance,  to  lose  a 
creeping  sorrow,  to  forget  that  too 
many  of  your  hours  are  sullen,  grey, 
bereft?  What  do  you  wish  of  Egypt? 

The  Sphinx  will  not  ask  you,  will  not 
care.  The  Pyramids,  lifting  their  un- 
numbered stones  to  the  clear  and  wonder- 
ful skies,  have  held,  still  hold,  their  se- 
crets; but  they  do  not  seek  for  yours. 
The  terrific  temples,  the  hot,  mysterious 
tombs,  odorous  of  the  dead  desires  of 
men,  crouching  in  and  under  the  immeas- 
urable sands,  will  mock  you  with  their 
3 


4  THE    PYRAMIDS 

brooding  silence,  with  their  dim  and  som- 
bre repose.  The  brown  children  of  the 
Nile,  the  toilers  who  sing  their  antique 
songs  by  the  shadoof  and  the  sakieh,  the 
dragomans,  the  smiling  goblin  merchants, 
the  Bedouins  who  lead  your  camel  into 
the  pale  recesses  of  the  dunes — these  will 
not  trouble  themselves  about  your  deep 
desires,  your  perhaps  yearning  hunger  of 
the  heart  and  the  imagination. 

Yet  Egypt  is  not  unresponsive. 

I  came  back  to  her  with  dread,  after 
fourteen  years  of  absence — years  filled 
for  me  with  the  rumors  of  her  changes. 
And  on  the  very  day  of  my  arrival  she 
calmly  reassured  me.  She  told  me  in  her 
supremely  magical  way  that  all  was  well 
with  her.  She  taught  me  once  more  a  les- 
son I  had  not  quite  forgotten,  but  that  I 
was  glad  to  learn  again — the  lesson  that 
Egypt  owes  her  most  subtle,  most  inner 
beauty  to  Kheper,  although  she  owes  her 
marvels  to  men ;  that  when  he  created  the 
sun  which  shines  upon  her,  he  gave  her 


THE    PYRAMIDS  5 

the  lustre  of  her  life,  and  that  those  who 
come  to  her  must  be  sun-worshippers  if 
they  would  truly  and  intimately  under- 
stand the  treasure  of  romance  that  lies 
heaped  within  her  bosom. 

Thoth,  says  the  old  legend,  travelled  in 
the  Boat  of  the  Sun.  If  you  would  love 
Egypt  rightly,  you,  too,  must  be  a  travel- 
ler in  that  bark.  You  must  not  fear  to 
steep  yourself  in  the  mystery  of  gold,  in 
the  mystery  of  heat,  in  the  mystery  of 
silence  that  seems  softly  showered  out  of 
the  sun.  The  sacred  white  lotus  must 
be  your  emblem,  and  Horus,  the  hawk- 
headed,  merged  in  Ra,  your  special 
deity.  Scarcely  had  I  set  foot  once  more 
in  Egypt  before  Thoth  lifted  me  into  the 
Boat  of  the  Sun  and  soothed  my  fears  to 
sleep. 

I  arrived  in  Cairo.  I  saw  new  and 
vast  hotels;  I  saw  crowded  streets;  bril- 
liant shops;  English  officials  driving  im- 
portantly in  victorias,  surely  to  pay  dread- 
ful calls  of  ceremony;  women  in  gigantic 


6  THE    PYRAMIDS 

hats,  with  Niagaras  of  veil,  waving  white 
gloves  as  they  talked  of — I  guess — the 
latest  Cairene  scandal.  I  perceived  on  the 
right  hand  and  on  the  left  waiters  created 
in  Switzerland,  hall  porters  made  in  Ger- 
many, Levantine  touts,  determined  Jews 
holding  false  antiquities  in  their  lean  fin- 
gers, an  English  Baptist  minister,  in  a 
white  helmet,  drinking  chocolate  on  a  ter- 
race, with  a  guide-book  in  one  fist,  a 
ticket  to  visit  monuments  in  the  other.  I 
heard  Scottish  soldiers  playing,  "  I'll  be 
in  Scotland  before  ye ! "  and  something 
within  me,  a  lurking  hope,  I  suppose, 
seemed  to  founder  and  collapse — but  only 
for  a  moment.  It  was  after  four  in  the 
afternoon.  Soon  day  would  be  declining. 
And  I  seemed  to  remember  that  the  de- 
cline of  day  in  Egypt  had  moved  me  long 
ago — moved  me  as  few,  rare  things  have 
ever  done.  Within  half  an  hour  I  was 
alone,  far  up  the  long  road — Ismail's 
road — that  leads  from  the  suburbs  of 
Cairo  to  the  Pyramids.  And  then  Egypt 


THE    PYRAMIDS  7 

took  me  like  a  child  by  the  hand  and  re- 
assured me. 

It  was  the  first  week  of  November,  high 
Nile  had  not  subsided,  and  all  the  land 
here,  between  the  river  and  the  sand 
where  the  Sphinx  keeps  watch,  was  hid- 
den beneath  the  vast  and  tranquil  waters 
of  what  seemed  a  tideless  sea — a  sea 
fringed  with  dense  masses  of  date-palms, 
girdled  in  the  far  distance  by  palm-trees 
that  looked  almost  black,  broken  by  low 
and  tiny  islands  on  which  palm-trees  kept 
the  white  and  the  brown  houses  in  their 
feathery  embrace.  Above  these  isolated 
houses  pigeons  circled.  In  the  distance 
the  lateen  sails  of  boats  glided,  sometimes 
behind  the  palms,  coming  into  view,  van- 
ishing, mysteriously  reappearing  among 
their  narrow  trunks.  Here  and  there  a 
living  thing  moved  slowly,  wading  home- 
ward through  this  sea:  a  camel  from  the 
sands  of  Ghizeh,  a  buffalo,  two  donkeys, 
followed  by  boys  who  held  with  brown 
hands  their  dark  blue  skirts  near  their 


8  THE    PYRAMIDS 

faces,  a  Bedouin  leaning  forward  upon 
the  neck  of  his  quickly  stepping  horse. 
At  one  moment  I  seemed  to  look  upon  the 
lagoons  of  Venice,  a  watery  vision  full  of 
a  glassy  calm.  Then  the  palm-trees  in 
the  water,  and  growing  to  its  edge,  the 
pale  sands  that,  far  as  the  eyes  could  see, 
from  Ghizeh  to  Sakkara  and  beyond, 
fringed  it  toward  the  west,  made  me  think 
of  the  Pacific,  of  palmy  islands,  of  a  para- 
dise where  men  grow  drowsy  in  well- 
being,  and  dream  away  the  years.  And 
then  I  looked  still  farther,  beyond  the 
pallid  line  of  the  sands,  and  I  saw  a  Pyra- 
mid of  gold,  the  wonder  Khuf  u  had  built. 
As  a  golden  wonder  it  saluted  me  after 
all  my  years  of  absence.  Later  I  was  to 
see  it  grey  as  grey  sands,  sulphur  color 
in  the  afternoon  from  very  near  at  hand, 
black  as  a  monument  draped  in  funereal 
velvet  for  a  mourning  under  the  stars  at 
night,  white  as  a  monstrous  marble  tomb 
soon  after  dawn  from  the  sand-dunes  be- 
tween it  and  Sakkara.  But  as  a  golden 


THE    PYRAMIDS  9 

thing  it  greeted  me,  as  a  golden  miracle 
I  shall  remember  it. 

Slowly  the  sun  went  down.  The  sec- 
ond Pyramid  seemed  also  made  of  gold. 
Drowsily  splendid  it  and  its  greater 
brother  looked  set  on  the  golden  sands  be- 
neath the  golden  sky.  And  now  the  gold 
came  travelling  down  from  the  desert  to 
the  water,  turning  it  surely  to  a  wine  like 
the  wine  of  gold  that  flowed  down  Midas's 
throat ;  then,  as  the  magic  grew,  to  a  Pac- 
tolus,  and  at  last  to  a  great  surface  that 
resembled  golden  ice,  hard,  glittering,  un- 
broken by  any  ruffling  wave.  The  islands 
rising  from  this  golden  ice  were  jet  black, 
the  houses  black,  the  palms  and  their  shad- 
ows that  fell  upon  the  marvel  black. 
Black  were  the  birds  that  flew  low  from 
roof  to  roof,  black  the  wading  camels, 
black  the  meeting  leaves  of  the  tall  leb- 
bek-trees  that  formed  a  tunnel  from  where 
I  stood  to  Mena  House.  And  presently 
a  huge  black  Pyramid  lay  supine  on  the 
gold,  and  near  it  a  shadowy  brother 


io  THE    PYRAMIDS 

seemed  more  humble  than  it,  but  scarcely 
less  mysterious.  The  gold  deepened, 
glowed  more  fiercely.  In  the  sky  above 
the  Pyramids  hung  tiny  cloud  wreaths  of 
rose  red,  delicate  and  airy  as  the  gossa- 
mers of  Tunis.  As  I  turned,  far  off  in 
Cairo  I  saw  the  first  lights  glittering 
across  the  fields  of  doura,  silvery  white, 
like  diamonds.  But  the  silver  did  not  call 
me.  My  imagination  was  held  captive  by 
the  gold.  I  was  summoned  by  the  gold, 
and  I  went  on,  under  the  black  lebbek- 
trees,  on  Ismail's  road,  toward  it.  And  I 
dwelt  in  it  many  days. 

The  wonders  of  Egypt  man  has  made 
seem  to  increase  in  stature  before  the 
spirits'  eyes  as  man  learns  to  know  them 
better,  to  tower  up  ever  higher  till  the  im- 
agination is  almost  stricken  by  their  loom- 
ing greatness.  Climb  the  Great  Pyramid, 
spend  a  day  with  Abou  on  its  summit, 
come  down,  penetrate  into  its  recesses, 
stand  in  the  king's  chamber,  listen  to  the 
silence  there,  feel  it  with  your  hands — is 


THE    PYRAMIDS  n 

it  not  tangible  in  this  hot  fastness  of  in- 
corruptible death? — creep,  like  the  sur- 
reptitious midget  you  feel  yourself  to  be, 
up  those  long  and  steep  inclines  of  pol- 
ished stone,  watching  the  gloomy  dark- 
ness of  the  narrow  walls,  the  far-off  pin- 
point of  light  borne  by  the  Bedouin  who 
guides  you,  hear  the  twitter  of  the  bats 
that  have  their  dwelling  in  this  monstrous 
gloom  that  man  has  made  to  shelter  the 
thing  whose  ambition  could  never  be  em- 
balmed, though  that,  of  all  qualities, 
should  have  been  given  here,  in  the  land 
it  dowered,  a  life  perpetual.  Now  you 
know  the  Great  Pyramid.  You  know 
that  you  can  climb  it,  that  you  can  enter 
it.  You  have  seen  it  from  all  sides,  under 
all  aspects.  It  is  familiar  to  you. 

No,  it  can  never  be  that.  With  its 
more  wonderful  comrade,  the  Sphinx,  it 
has  the  power  peculiar,  so  it  seems  to  me, 
to  certain  of  the  rock  and  stone  monu- 
ments of  Egypt,  of  holding  itself  ever 
aloof,  almost  like  the  soul  of  man  which 


12  THE    PYRAMIDS 

can  retreat  at  will,  like  the  Bedouin  re- 
treating from  you  into  the  blackness  of 
the  Pyramid,  far  up,  or  far  down,  where 
the  pursuing  stranger,  unaided,  cannot 
follow. 


THE  SPHINX 


II 

THE  SPHINX 

ONE  day  at  sunset  I  saw  a  bird  trying  to 
play  with  the  Sphinx — a  bird  like  a  swal- 
low, but  with  a  ruddy  brown  on  its  breast, 
a  gleam  of  blue  somewhere  on  its  wings. 
When  I  came  to  the  edge  of  the  sand  ba- 
sin where  perhaps  Khufu  saw  it  lying 
nearly  four  thousand  years  before  the 
birth  of  Christ,  the  Sphinx  and  the  bird 
were  quite  alone.  The  bird  flew  near  the 
Sphinx,  whimsically  turning  this  way  and 
that,  flying  now  low,  now  high,  but  ever 
returning  to  the  magnet  which  drew  it, 
which  held  it,  from  which  it  surely  longed 
to  extract  some  sign  of  recognition.  It 
twittered,  it  poised  itself  in  the  golden  air, 
with  its  bright  eyes  fixed  upon  those  eyes 
15 


16  THE    SPHINX 

of  stone  which  gazed  beyond  it,  beyond 
the  land  of  Egypt,  beyond  the  world  of 
men,  beyond  the  centre  of  the  sun  to  the 
last  verges  of  eternity.  And  presently 
it  alighted  on  the  head  of  the  Sphinx,  then 
on  its  ear,  then  on  its  breast;  and  over 
the  breast  it  tripped  jerkily,  with  tiny, 
elastic  steps,  looking  upward,  its  whole 
body  quivering  apparently  with  a  desire 
for  comprehension — a  desire  for  some 
manifestation  of  friendship.  Then  sud- 
denly it  spread  its  wings,  and,  straight  as 
an  arrow,  it  flew  away  over  the  sands  and 
the  waters  toward  the  doura-fields  and 
Cairo. 

And  the  sunset  waned,  and  the  after- 
glow flamed  and  faded,  and  the  clear,  soft 
African  night  fell.  The  pilgrims  who 
day  by  day  visit  the  Sphinx,  like  the  bird, 
had  gone  back  to  Cairo.  They  had  come, 
as  the  bird  had  come;  as  those  who  have 
conquered  Egypt  came;  as  the  Greeks 
came,  Alexander  of  Macedon,  and  the 
Ptolemies;  as  the  Romans  came;  as  the 


THE    SPHINX  17 

Mamelukes,  the  Turks,  the  French,  the 
English  came. 

They  had  come — and  gone. 

And  that  enormous  face,  with  the  stains 
of  stormy  red  still  adhering  to  its  cheeks, 
grew  dark  as  the  darkness  closed  in, 
turned  brown  as  a  fellah's  face,  as  the 
face  of  that  fellah  who  whispered  his  se- 
cret in  the  Sphinx's  ear,  but  learnt  no  se- 
cret in  return;  turned  black  almost  as  a 
Nubian's  face.  The  night  accentuated  its 
appearance  of  terrible  repose,  of  super- 
human indifference  to  whatever  might  be- 
fall. In  the  night  I  seemed  to  hear  the 
footsteps  of  the  dead — of  all  the  dead 
warriors  and  the  steeds  they  rode,  defiling 
over  the  sand  before  the  unconquerable 
thing  they  perhaps  thought  that  they  had 
conquered.  At  last  the  footsteps  died 
away.  There  was  a  silence.  Then,  com- 
ing down  from  the  Great  Pyramid,  surely 
I  heard  the  light  patter  of  a  donkey's  feet. 
They  went  to  the  Sphinx  and  ceased.  The 
silence  was  profound.  And  I  remembered 


i8  THE    SPHINX 

the  legend  that  Mary,  Joseph,  and  the 
Holy  Child  once  halted  here  on  their  long 
journey,  and  that  Mary  laid  the  tired 
Christ  between  the  paws  of  the  Sphinx 
to  sleep.  Yet  even  of  the  Christ  the  soul 
within  that  body  could  take  no  heed  at  all. 
It  is,  I  think,  one  of  the  most  astound- 
ing facts  in  the  history  of  man  that  a 
man  was  able  to  contain  within  his  mind, 
to  conceive,  the  conception  of  the  Sphinx. 
That  he  could  carry  it  out  in  the  stone  is 
amazing.  But  how  much  more  amazing 
it  is  that  before  there  was  the  Sphinx  he 
was  able  to  see  it  with  his  imagination! 
One  may  criticise  the  Sphinx.  One  may 
say  impertinent  things  that  are  true  about 
it :  that  seen  from  behind  at  a  distance  its 
head  looks  like  an  enormous  mushroom 
growing  in  the  sand,  that  its  cheeks  are 
swelled  inordinately,  that  its  thick-lipped 
mouth  is  legal,  that  from  certain  places  it 
bears  a  resemblance  to  a  prize  bull-dog. 
All  this  does  not  matter  at  all.  What 
does  matter  is  that  into  the  conception  and 


THE    SPHINX  19 

execution  of  the  Sphinx  has  been  poured 
a  supreme  imaginative  power.  He  who 
created  it  looked  beyond  Egypt,  beyond 
the  life  of  man.  He  grasped  the  concep- 
tion of  Eternity,  and  realized  the  noth- 
ingness of  Time,  and  he  rendered  it  in 
stone. 

I  can  imagine  the  most  determined  athe- 
ist looking  at  the  Sphinx  and,  in  a  flash, 
not  merely  believing,  but  feeling  that  he 
had  before  him  proof  of  the  life  of  the 
soul  beyond  the  grave,  of  the  life  of  the 
soul  of  Khufu  beyond  the  tomb  of  his 
Pyramid.  Always  as  you  return  to  the 
Sphinx  you  wonder  at  it  more,  you  adore 
more  strangely  its  repose,  you  steep  your- 
self more  intimately  in  the  aloof  peace 
that  seems  to  emanate  from  it  as  light 
emanates  from  the  sun.  And  as  you  look 
on  it  at  last  perhaps  you  understand  the 
infinite;  you  understand  where  is  the 
bourne  to  which  the  finite  flows  with  all 
its  greatness,  as  the  great  Nile  flows  from 
beyond  Victoria  Nyanza  to  the  sea. 


20  THE    SPHINX 

And  as  the  wonder  of  the  Sphinx  takes 
possession  of  you  gradually,  so  gradually 
do  you  learn  to  feel  the  majesty  of  the 
Pyramids  of  Ghizeh.  Unlike  the  Step 
Pyramid  of  Sakkara,  which,  even  when 
one  is  near  it,  looks  like  a  small  mountain, 
part  of  the  land  on  which  it  rests,  the 
Pyramids  of  Ghizeh  look  what  they  are 
— artificial  excrescences,  invented  and 
carried  out  by  man,  expressions  of  man's 
greatness.  Exquisite  as  they  are  as  feat- 
ures of  the  drowsy  golden  landscape  at 
the  setting  of  the  sun,  I  think  they  look 
most  wonderful  at  night,  when  they  are 
black  beneath  the  stars.  On  many  nights 
I  have  sat  in  the  sand  at  a  distance  and 
looked  at  them,  and  always,  and  increas- 
ingly, they  have  stirred  my  imagination. 
Their  profound  calm,  their  classical  sim- 
plicity, are  greatly  emphasized  when  no 
detail  can  be  seen,  when  they  are  but  black 
shapes  towering  to  the  stars.  They  seem 
to  aspire  then  like  prayers  prayed  by  one 
who  has  said,  "  God  does  not  need  my 


THE    SPHINX  21 

prayers,  but  I  need  them."  In  their  sim- 
plicity they  suggest  a  crowd  of  thoughts, 
and  of  desires.  Guy  de  Maupassant  has 
said  that  of  all  the  arts  architecture  is 
perhaps  the  most  aesthetic,  the  most  mys- 
terious, and  the  most  nourished  by  ideas. 
How  true  this  is  you  feel  as  you  look 
at  the  Great  Pyramid  by  night.  It 
seems  to  breathe  out  mystery.  The 
immense  base  recalls  to  you  the  laby- 
rinth within;  the  long  descent  from  the 
tiny  slit  that  gives  you  entrance,  your  un- 
certain steps  in  its  hot,  eternal  night,  your 
falls  on  the  ice-like  surfaces  of  its  polished 
blocks  of  stone,  the  crushing  weight  that 
seemed  to  lie  on  your  heart  as  you  stole 
uncertainly  on,  summoned  almost  as  by 
the  desert;  your  sensation  of  being  for 
ever  imprisoned,  taken  and  hidden  by  a 
monster  from  Egypt's  wonderful  light,  as 
you  stood  in  the  central  chamber,  and 
realized  the  stone  ocean  into  whose 
depths,  like  some  intrepid  diver,  you  had 
dared  deliberately  to  come.  And  then 


22  THE   SPHINX 

your  eyes  travel  up  the  slowly  shrinking 
walls  till  they  reach  the  dark  point  which 
is  the  top.  There  you  stood  with  Abou, 
who  spends  half  his  life  on  the  highest 
stone,  hostages  of  the  sun,  bathed  in  light 
and  air  that  perhaps  came  to  you  from  the 
Gold  Coast.  And  you  saw  men  and  cam- 
els like  flies,  and  Cairo  like  a  grey  blur, 
and  the  Mokattam  hills  almost  as  a  higher 
ridge  of  the  sands.  The  mosque  of  Mo- 
hammed Ali  was  like  a  cup  turned  over. 
Far  below  slept  the  dead  in  that  grave- 
yard of  the  Sphinx,  with  its  pale  stones, 
its  sand,  its  palm,  its  "  Sycamores  of  the 
South,"  once  worshipped  and  regarded  as 
Hathor's  living  body.  And  beyond  them 
on  one  side  were  the  sleeping  waters,  with 
islands  small,  surely,  as  delicate  Egyp- 
tian hands,  and  on  the  other  the  great 
desert  that  stretches,  so  the  Bedouins  say, 
on  and  on  "  for  a  march  of  a  thousand 
days." 

That  base  and  that  summit — what  sug- 
gestion and  what  mystery  in  their  con- 


THE    SPHINX  23 

trast !  What  sober,  eternal  beauty  in  the 
dark  line  which  unites  them,  now  sharply, 
yet  softly,  defined  against  the  night,  which 
is  purple  as  the  one  garment  of  the  fel- 
lah! That  line  leads  the  soul  irresistibly 
from  earth  to  the  stars. 


SAKKARA 


ra 

SAKKARA 

IT  was  the  "  Little  Christmas "  of  the 
Egyptians  as  I  rode  to  Sakkara,  after 
seeing  a  wonderful  feat,  the  ascent  and 
descent  of  the  second  Pyramid  in  nine- 
teen minutes  by  a  young  Bedouin  called 
Mohammed  AH,  who  very  seriously  in- 
formed me  that  the  only  Roumi  who  had 
ever  reached  the  top  was  an  "  American 
gentlemens  "  called  Mark  Twain,  on  his 
first  visit  to  Egypt.  On  his  second  visit, 
Ali  said,  Mr.  Twain  had  a  bad  foot,  and 
declared  he  could  not  be  bothered  with 
the  second  Pyramid.  He  had  been  up  and 
down  it  once  without  a  guide ;  he  had  dis- 
turbed the  jackal  which  lives  near  its  sum- 
mit, and  which  I  saw  running  in  the  sun- 


28  SAKKARA 

shine  as  AH  drew  near  its  lair,  and  he  was 
satisfied  to  rest  on  his  immortal  laurels. 
To  the  Bedouins  of  the  Pyramids  Mark 
Twain's  world-wide  celebrity  is  owing  to 
one  fact  alone:  he  is  the  only  Roumi  who 
has  climbed  the  second  Pyramid.  That 
is  why  his  name  is  known  to  every 
one. 

It  was  the  "Little  Christmas,"  and 
from  the  villages  in  the  plain  the  Egyp- 
tians came  pouring  out  to  visit  their  dead 
in  the  desert  cemeteries  as  I  passed  by  to 
visit  the  dead  in  the  tombs  far  off  on  the 
horizon.  Women,  swathed  in  black,  gath- 
ered in  groups  and  jumped  monotonously 
up  and  down,  to  the  accompaniment  of 
stained  hands  clapping,  and  strange  and 
weary  songs.  Tiny  children  blew  furi- 
ously into  tin  trumpets,  emitting  sounds 
that  were  terribly  European.  Men  strode 
seriously  by,  or  stood  in  knots  among  the 
graves,  talking  vivaciously  of  the  things 
of  this  life.  As  the  sun  rose  higher  in 
the  heavens,  this  visit  to  the  dead  became 


SAKKARA  29 

a  carnival  of  the  living.  Laughter  and 
shrill  cries  of  merriment  betokened  the 
resignation  of  the  mourners.  The  sand- 
dunes  were  black  with  running  figures, 
racing,  leaping,  chasing  one  another,  roll- 
ing over  and  over  in  the  warm  and  golden 
grains.  Some  sat  among  the  graves  and 
ate.  Some  sang.  Some  danced.  I  saw 
no  one  praying,  after  the  sun  was  up. 
The  Great  Pyramid  of  Ghizeh  was  trans- 
formed in  this  morning  hour,  and  gleamed 
like  a  marble  mountain,  or  like  the  hill 
covered  with  salt  at  El-Outaya,  in  Al- 
geria. As  we  went  on  it  sank  down  into 
the  sands,  until  at  last  I  could  see  only  a 
small  section  with  its  top,  which  looked 
almost  as  pointed  as  a  gigantic  needle. 
Abou  was  there  on  the  hot  stones  in  the 
golden  eye  of  the  sun — Abou  who  lives  to 
respect  his  Pyramid,  and  to  serve  Turk- 
ish coffee  to  those  who  are  determined 
enough  to  climb  it.  Before  me  the  Step 
Pyramid  rose,  brown  almost  as  bronze, 
out  of  the  sands  here  desolate  and  pallid. 


30  SAKKARA 

Soon  I  was  in  the  house  of  Marriette,  be- 
tween the  little  sphinxes. 

Near  Cairo,  although  the  desert  is  real 
desert,  it  does  not  give,  to  me,  at  any  rate, 
the  immense  impression  of  naked  sterility, 
of  almost  brassy,  sun-baked  fierceness, 
which  often  strikes  one  in  the  Sahara  to 
the  south  of  Algeria,  where  at  midday 
one  sometimes  has  a  feeling  of  being  lost 
upon  a  waste  of  metal,  gleaming,  angry, 
tigerish  in  color.  Here,  in  Egypt,  both 
the  people  and  the  desert  seem  gentler, 
safer,  more  amiable.  Yet  these  tombs  of 
Sakkara  are  hidden  in  a  desolation  of  the 
sands,  peculiarly  blanched  and  mournful; 
and  as  you  wander  from  tomb  to 
tomb,  descending  and  ascending,  stealing 
through  great  galleries  beneath  the  sands, 
creeping  through  tubes  of  stone,  crouch- 
ing almost  on  hands  and  knees  in  the  sul- 
try chambers  of  the  dead,  the  awfulness 
of  the  passing  away  of  dynasties  and  of 
races  comes,  like  a  cloud,  upon  your  spirit. 
But  this  cloud  lifts  and  floats  from  you 


SAKKARA  31 

in  the  cheerful  tomb  of  Thi,  that  royal 
councillor,  that  scribe  and  confidant, 
whose  life  must  have  been  passed  in  a 
round  of  serene  activities,  amid  a  sneer- 
ing, though  doubtless  admiring,  popula- 
tion. 

Into  this  tomb  of  white,  vivacious  fig- 
ures, gay  almost,  though  never  wholly 
frivolous — for  these  men  were  full  of 
purpose,  full  of  an  ardor  that  seduces 
even  where  it  seems  grotesque — I  took 
with  me  a  child  of  ten  called  AH,  from 
the  village  of  Kafiah;  and  as  I  looked 
from  him  to  the  walls  around  us,  rather 
than  the  passing  away  of  the  races,  I  re- 
alized the  persistence  of  type.  For  every- 
where I  saw  the  face  of  little  AH,  with 
every  feature  exactly  reproduced.  Here 
he  was  bending  over  a  sacrifice,  leading  a 
sacred  bull,  feeding  geese  from  a  cup, 
roasting  a  chicken,  pulling  a  boat,  car- 
pentering, polishing,  conducting  a  mon- 
key for  a  walk,  or  merely  sitting  bolt  up- 
right and  sneering.  There  were  lines  of 


32  SAKKARA 

little  Alls  with  their  hands  held  to  their 
breasts,  their  faces  in  profile,  their  knees 
rigid,  in  the  happy  tomb  of  Thi;  but  he 
glanced  at  them  unheeding,  did  not  recog- 
nize his  ancestors.  And  he  did  not  care 
to  penetrate  into  the  tombs  of  Mera  and 
Meri-Ra-ankh,  into  the  Serapeum  and  the 
Mestaba  of  Ptah-hotep.  Perhaps  he  was 
right.  The  Serapeum  is  grand  in  its  vast- 
ness,  with  its  long  and  high  galleries  and 
its  mighty  vaults  containing  the  huge 
granite  sarcophagi  of  the  sacred  bulls  of 
Apis ;  Mera,  red  and  white,  welcomes  you 
from  an  elevated  niche  benignly;  Ptah- 
hotep,  priest  of  the  fifth  dynasty,  receives 
you,  seated  at  a  table  that  resembles  a 
rake  with  long,  yellow  teeth  standing  on 
its  handle,  and  drinking  stiffly  a  cup  of 
wine.  You  see  upon  the  wall  near  by,  with 
sympathy,  a  patient  being  plied  by  a  naked 
and  evidently  an  unyielding  physician 
with  medicine  from  a  jar  that  might  have 
been  visited  by  Morgiana,  a  musician 
playing  upon  an  instrument  like  a  huge 


SAKKARA  33 

and  stringless  harp.  But  it  is  the  happy 
tomb  of  Thi  that  lingers  in  your  memory. 
In  that  tomb  one  sees  proclaimed  with  a 
marvellous  ingenuity  and  expressiveness 
the  joy  and  the  activity  of  life.  Thi  must 
have  loved  life;  loved  prayer  and  sacri- 
fice, loved  sport  and  war,  loved  feasting 
and  gaiety,  labor  of  the  hands  and  of  the 
head,  loved  the  arts,  the  music  of  flute 
and  harp,  singing  by  the  lingering  and 
plaintive  voices  which  seem  to  express  the 
essence  of  the  East,  loved  sweet  odors, 
loved  sweet  women — do  we  not  see  him 
sitting  to  receive  offerings  with  his  wife 
beside  him? — loved  the  clear  nights  and 
the  radiant  days  that  in  Egypt  make  glad 
the  heart  of  man.  He  must  have  loved 
the  splendid  gift  of  life,  and  used  it  com- 
pletely. And  so  little  Ali  did  very  right 
to  make  his  sole  obeisance  at  Thi's  deli- 
cious tomb,  from  which  death  itself  seems 
banished  by  the  soft  and  embracing  radi- 
ance of  the  almost  living  walls. 

This  delicate  cheerfulness,  a  quite  airy 


34  SAKKARA 

gaiety  of  life,  is  often  combined  in  Egypt, 
and  most  beautifully  and  happily  com- 
bined, with  tremendous  solidity,  heavy 
impressiveness,  a  hugeness  that  is  well- 
nigh  tragic ;  and  it  supplies  a  relief  to  eye, 
to  mind,  to  soul,  that  is  sweet  and  refresh- 
ing as  the  trickle  of  a  tarantella  from  a 
reed  flute  heard  under  the  shadows  of  a 
temple  of  Hercules.  Life  showers  us  with 
contrasts.  Art,  which  gives  to  us  a  sec- 
ond and  a  more  withdrawn  life,  opening 
to  us  a  door  through  which  we  pass  to 
our  dreams,  may  well  imitate  life  in  this. 


ABYDOS 


IV 

ABYDOS 

THROUGH  a  long  and  golden  noontide, 
and  on  into  an  afternoon  whose  opulence 
of  warmth  and  light  it  seemed  could  never 
wane,  I  sat  alone,  or  wandered  gently 
quite  alone,  in  the  Temple  of  Seti  I.  at 
Abydos.  Here  again  I  was  in  a  place 
of  the  dead.  In  Egypt  one  ever  seeks  the 
dead  in  the  sunshine,  black  vaults  in  the 
land  of  the  gold.  But  here  in  Abydos  I 
was  accompanied  by  whiteness.  The  gen- 
eral effect  of  Seti's  mighty  temple  is  that 
it  is  a  white  temple  when  seen  in  full  sun- 
shine and  beneath  a  sky  of  blinding  blue. 
In  an  arid  place  it  stands,  just  beyond  an 
Egyptian  village  that  is  a  maze  of  dust, 
37 


38  ABYDOS 

of  children,  of  animals,  and  flies.  The 
last  blind  houses  of  the  village,  brown  as 
brown  paper,  confront  it  on  a  mound,  and 
as  I  came  toward  it  a  girl-child  swathed 
in  purple,  with  ear-rings,  and  a  twist  of 
orange  handkerchief  above  her  eyes,  full 
of  cloud  and  fire,  leaned  from  a  roof,  sin- 
uously as  a  young  snake,  to  watch  me. 
On  each  side,  descending,  were  white, 
ruined  walls,  stretched  out  like  defaced 
white  arms  of  the  temple  to  receive  me. 
I  stood  still  for  a  moment  and  looked  at 
the  narrow,  severely  simple  doorway,  at 
the  twelve  broken  columns  advanced  on 
either  side,  white  and  greyish  white  with 
their  right  angles,  their  once  painted  fig- 
ures now  almost  wholly  colorless. 

Here  lay  the  Osirians,  those  blessed 
dead  of  the  land  of  Egypt,  who  wor- 
shipped the  Judge  of  the  Dead,  the  Lord 
of  the  Underworld,  and  who  hoped  for 
immortality  through  him — Osiris,  hus- 
band of  Isis,  Osiris,  receiver  of  prayers, 
Osiris  the  sun  who  will  not  be  conquered 


ABYDOS  39 

by  night,  but  eternally  rises  again,  and 
so  is  the  symbol  of  the  resurrection  of  the 
soul.  It  is  said  that  Set,  the  power  of 
Evil,  tore  the  body  of  Osiris  into  fourteen 
fragments  and  scattered  them  over  the 
land.  But  multitudes  of  worshippers  of 
Osiris  believed  him  buried  near  Abydos 
and,  like  those  who  loved  the  sweet  songs 
of  Hafiz,  they  desired  to  be  buried  near 
him  whom  they  adored;  and  so  this  place 
became  a  place  of  the  dead,  a  place  of 
many  prayers,  a  white  place  of  many 
longings. 

I  was  glad  to  be  alone  there.  The 
guardian  left  me  in  perfect  peace.  I  hap- 
pily forgot  him.  I  sat  down  in  the  shadow 
of  a  column  upon  its  mighty  projecting 
base.  The  sky  was  blinding  blue.  Great 
bees  hummed,  like  bourdons,  through  the 
silence,  deepening  the  almost  heavy  calm. 
These  columns,  architraves,  doorways, 
how  mighty,  how  grandly  strong  they 
were !  And  yet  soon  I  began  to  be  aware 
that  even  here,  where  surely  one  should 


40  ABYDOS 

read  only  the  Book  of  the  Dead,  or  bend 
down  to  the  hot  ground  to  listen  if  per- 
chance one  might  hear  the  dead  them- 
selves murmuring  over  the  chapters  of 
Beatification  far  down  in  their  hidden 
tombs,  there  was  a  likeness,  a  gentle 
gaiety  of  life,  as  in  the  tomb  of  Thi.  The 
effect  of  solidity  was  immense.  These 
columns  bulged,  almost  like  great  fruits 
swollen  out  by  their  heady  strength  of 
blood.  They  towered  up  in  crowds.  The 
heavy  roof,  broken  in  places  most  merci- 
fully to  show  squares  and  oblongs  of  that 
perfect,  calling  blue,  was  like  a  frowning 
brow.  And  yet  I  was  with  grace,  with 
gentleness,  with  lightness,  because  in  the 
place  of  the  dead  I  was  again  with  the 
happy,  living  walls.  Above  me,  on  the 
roof,  there  was  a  gleam  of  palest  blue, 
like  the  blue  I  have  sometimes  seen  at 
morning  on  the  Ionian  sea  just  where  it 
meets  the  shore.  The  double  rows  of  gi- 
gantic columns  stretched  away,  tall  al- 
most as  forest  trees,  to  right  of  me  and 


ABYDOS  41 

to  left,  and  were  shut  in  by  massive  walls, 
strong  as  the  walls  of  a  fortress.  And  on 
these  columns,  and  on  these  walls,  dead 
painters  and  gravers  had  breathed  the 
sweet  breath  of  life.  Here  in  the  sun, 
for  me  alone,  as  it  seemed,  a  population 
followed  their  occupations.  Men  walked, 
and  kneeled,  and  stood,  some  white  and 
clothed,  some  nude,  some  red  as  the  red 
man's  child  that  leaped  beyond  the  sea. 
And  here  was  the  lotus-flower  held  in 
reverent  hands,  not  the  rose-lotus,  but  the 
blossom  that  typified  the  rising  again  of 
the  sun,  and  that,  worn  as  an  amulet,  sig- 
nified the  gift  of  eternal  youth.  And  here 
was  hawk-faced  Horus,  and  here  a  priest 
offering  sacrifice  to  a  god,  belief  in  whom 
has  long  since  passed  away.  A  king  re- 
vealed himself  to  me,  adoring  Ptah, 
"  Father  of  the  beginnings,"  who  estab- 
lished upon  earth,  my  figures  thought,  the 
everlasting  justice,  and  again  at  the  knees 
of  Amen  burning  incense  in  his  honor. 
Isis  and  Osiris  stood  together,  and  sacri- 


42  ABYDOS 

fice  was  made  before  their  sacred  bark. 
And  Seti  worshipped  them,  and  Seshta, 
goddess  of  learning,  wrote  in  the  book  of 
eternity  the  name  of  the  king. 

The  great  bees  hummed,  moving  slowly 
in  the  golden  air  among  the  mighty  col- 
umns, passing  slowly  among  these  records 
of  lives  long  over,  but  which  seemed  still 
to  be.  And  I  looked  at  the  lotus-flowers 
which  the  little  grotesque  hands  were 
holding,  had  been  holding  for  how  many 
years — the  flowers  that  typified  the  rising 
again  of  the  sun  and  the  divine  gift  of 
eternal  youth.  And  I  thought  of  the  bird 
and  the  Sphinx,  the  thing  that  was  whim- 
sical wooing  the  thing  that  was  mighty. 
And  I  gazed  at  the  immense  columns  and 
at  the  light  and  little  figures  all  about  me. 
Bird  and  Sphinx,  delicate  whimsicality, 
calm  and  terrific  power!  In  Egypt  the 
dead  men  have  combined  them,  and  the 
combination  has  an  irresistible  fascina- 
tion, weaves  a  spell  that  entrances  you  in 
the  sunshine  and  beneath  the  blinding 


ABYDOS  43 

blue.  At  Abydos  I  knew  it.  And  I  loved 
the  columns  that  seemed  blown  out  with 
exuberant  strength,  and  I  loved  the  deli- 
cate white  walls  that,  like  the  lotus-flower, 
give  to  the  world  a  youth  that  seems  eter- 
nal— a  youth  that  is  never  frivolous,  but 
that  is  full  of  the  divine,  and  yet  pathetic, 
animation  of  happy  life. 

The  great  bees  hummed  more  drowsily. 
I  sat  quite  still  in  the  sun.  And  then 
presently,  moved  by  some  prompting  in- 
stinct, I  turned  my  head,  and,  far  off, 
through  the  narrow  portal  of  the  temple, 
I  saw  the  girl-child  swathed  in  purple  still 
lying,  sinuously  as  a  young  snake,  upon 
the  palm-wood  roof  above  the  brown  earth 
wall  to  watch  me  with  her  eyes  of  cloud 
and  fire. 

And  upon  me,  like  cloud  and  fire — cloud 
of  the  tombs  and  the  great  temple  col- 
umns, fire  of  the  brilliant  life  painted  and 
engraved  upon  them — there  stole  the  spell 
of  Egypt. 


THE  NILE 


I  DO  not  find  in  Egypt  any  more  the 
strangeness  that  once  amazed,  and  at  first 
almost  bewildered  me.  Stranger  far  is 
Morocco,  stranger  the  country  beyond 
Biskra,  near  Mogar,  round  Touggourt, 
even  about  El  Kantara.  There  I  feel  very 
far  away,  as  a  child  feels  distance  from 
dear,  familiar  things.  I  look  to  the  hori- 
zon expectant  of  I  know  not  what  magical 
occurrences,  what  mysteries.  I  am  aware 
of  the  summons  to  advance  to  marvellous 
lands,  where  marvellous  things  must  hap- 
pen. I  am  taken  by  that  sensation  of  al- 
most trembling  magic  which  came  to  me 
when  first  I  saw  a  mirage  far  out  in  the 
Sahara.  But  Egypt,  though  it  contains 
47 


48  THE    NILE 

so  many  marvels,  has  no  longer  for  me 
the  marvellous  atmosphere.  Its  keynote 
is  seductiveness. 

In  Egypt  one  feels  very  safe.  Smiling 
policemen  in  clothes  of  spotless  white — 
emblematic,  surely,  of  their  innocence! — 
seem  to  be  everywhere,  standing  calmly 
in  the  sun.  Very  gentle,  very  tender,  al- 
though perhaps  not  very  true,  are  the  Be- 
douins at  the  Pyramids.  Up  the  Nile  the 
fellaheen  smile  as  kindly  as  the  policemen, 
smile  protectingly  upon  you,  as  if  they 
would  say,  "  Allah  has  placed  us  here  to 
take  care  of  the  confiding  stranger."  No 
ferocious  demands  for  money  fall  upon 
my  ears ;  only  an  occasional  suggestion  is 
subtly  conveyed  to  me  that  even  the  poor 
must  live  and  that  I  am  immensely  rich. 
An  amiable,  an  almost  enticing  seductive- 
ness seems  emanating  from  the  fertile 
soil,  shining  in  the  golden  air,  gleaming 
softly  in  the  amber  sands,  dimpling  in  the 
brown,  the  mauve,  the  silver  eddies  of 
the  Nile.  It  steals  upon  one.  It  ripples 


THE    NILE  49 

over  one.  It  laps  one  as  if  with  warm 
and  scented  waves.  A  sort  of  lustrous 
languor  overtakes  one.  In  physical  well- 
being  one  sinks  down,  and  with  wide  eyes 
one  gazes  and  listens  and  enjoys,  and 
thinks  not  of  the  morrow. 

The  dahabiyeh — her  very  name,  the 
Loulia,  has  a  gentle,  seductive,  cooing 
sound — drifts  broadside  to  the  current 
with  furled  sails,  or  glides  smoothly  on 
before  an  amiable  north  wind  with  sails 
unfurled.  Upon  the  bloomy  banks,  rich 
brown  in  color,  the  brown  men  stoop  and 
straighten  themselves,  and  stoop  again, 
and  sing.  The  sun  gleams  on  their  cop- 
per skins,  which  look  polished  and  metal- 
lic. Crouched  in  his  net  behind  the  drowsy 
oxen,  the  little  boy  circles  the  livelong 
day  with  the  sakieh.  And  the  sakieh 
raises  its  wailing,  wayward  voice  and 
sings  to  the  shadoof;  and  the  shadoof 
sings  to  the  sakieh;  and  the  lifted  water 
falls  and  flows  away  into  the  green  wild- 
erness of  doura  that,  like  a  miniature 


50  THE   NILE 

forest,  spreads  on  every  hand  to  the  low 
mountains,  which  do  not  perturb  the 
spirit,  as  do  the  iron  mountains  of  Al- 
geria. And  always  the  sun  is  shining, 
and  the  body  is  drinking  in  its  warmth, 
and  the  soul  is  drinking  in  its  gold.  And 
always  the  ears  are  full  of  warm  and 
drowsy  and  monotonous  music.  And  al- 
ways the  eyes  see  the  lines  of  brown  bod- 
ies, on  the  brown  river-banks  above  the 
brown  waters,  bending,  straightening, 
bending,  straightening,  with  an  exquis- 
itely precise  monotony.  And  always  the 
Loulia  seems  to  be  drifting,  so  quietly 
she  slips  up,  or  down,  the  level  water- 
way. 

And  one  drifts,  too;  one  can  but  drift, 
happily,  sleepily,  forgetting  every  care. 
From  Abydos  to  Denderah  one  drifts,  and 
from  Denderah  to  Karnak,  to  Luxor,  to 
all  the  marvels  on  the  western  shore ;  and 
on  to  Edfu,  to  Kom  Ombos,  to  Assuan, 
and  perhaps  even  into  Nubia,  to  Abu- 
Simbel,  and  to  Wadi-Halfa.  Life  on  the 


THE   NILE  51 

Nile  is  a  long  dream,  golden  and  sweet  as 
honey  of  Hymettus.  For  I  let  the  "  di- 
vine serpent,"  who  at  Philae  may  be  seen 
issuing  from  her  charmed  cavern,  take 
me  very  quietly  to  see  the  abodes  of  the 
dead,  the  halls  of  the  vanished,  upon  her 
green  and  sterile  shores.  I  know  nothing 
of  the  bustling,  shrieking  steamer  that 
defies  her,  churning  into  angry  waves  her 
waters  for  the  edification  of  those  who 
would  "  do  "  Egypt  and  be  gone  before 
they  know  her. 

If  you  are  in  a  hurry,  do  not  come  to 
Egypt.  To  hurry  in  Egypt  is  as  wrong 
as  to  fall  asleep  in  Wall  Street,  or  to  sit 
in  the  Greek  Theatre  at  Taormina,  read- 
ing "  How  to  Make  a  Fortune  with  a 
Capital  of  Fifty  Pounds." 


DENDERAH 


VI 

DENDERAH 

FROM  Abydos,  home  of  the  cult  of  Osiris, 
Judge  of  the  Dead,  I  came  to  Denderah, 
the  great  temple  of  the  "  Lady  of  the 
Underworld,"  as  the  goddess  Hathor  was 
sometimes  called,  though  she  was  usually 
worshipped  as  the  Egyptian  Aphrodite, 
goddess  of  joy,  goddess  of  love  and  loveli- 
ness. It  was  early  morning  when  I  went 
ashore.  The  sun  was  above  the  eastern 
hills,  and  a  boy,  clad  in  a  rope  of  plaited 
grass,  sent  me  half  shyly  the  greeting, 
"May  your  day  be  happy !  " 

Youth  is,  perhaps,  the  most  divine  of 

all  the  gifts  of  the  gods,  as  those  who 

wore  the   lotus-blossom   amulet  believed 

thousands  of  years  ago,  and  Denderah, 

55 


56  DENDERAH 

appropriately,  is  a  very  young  Egyptian 
temple,  probably,  indeed,  the  youngest  of 
all  the  temples  on  the  Nile.  Its  youth- 
fulness — it  is  only  about  two  thousand 
years  of  age — identifies  it  happily  with 
the  happiness  and  beauty  of  its  presiding 
deity,  and  as  I  rode  toward  it  on  the  canal- 
bank  in  the  young  freshness  of  the  morn- 
ing, I  thought  of  the  goddess  Safekh 
and  of  the  sacred  Persea-tree.  When 
Safekh  inscribed  upon  a  leaf  of  the  Per- 
sea-tree the  name  of  king  or  conqueror, 
he  gained  everlasting  life.  Was  it  the 
life  of  youth?  An  everlasting  life  of 
middle  age  might  be  a  doubtful  benefit. 
And  then  mentally  I  added,  "  unless  one 
lived  in  Egypt,"  For  here  the  years  drop 
from  one,  and  every  golden  hour  brings 
to  one  surely  another  drop  of  the  won- 
drous essence  that  sets  time  at  defiance 
and  charms  sad  thoughts  away. 

Unlike  White  Abydos,  White  Den- 
derah  stands  apart  from  habitations,  in 
a  still  solitude  upon  a  blackened  mound. 


DENDERAH  57 

From  far  off  I  saw  the  fagade,  large,  bare, 
and  sober,  rising,  in  a  nakedness  as  com- 
plete as  that  of  Aphrodite  rising  from  the 
wave,  out  of  the  plain  of  brown,  alluvial 
soil  that  was  broken  here  and  there  by  a 
sharp  green  of  growing  things.  There 
was  something  of  sadness  in  the  scene, 
and  again  I  thought  of  Hathor  as  the 
"  Lady  of  the  Underworld,"  some  deep- 
eyed  being,  with  a  pale  brow,  hair  like 
the  night,  and  yearning,  wistful  hands 
stretched  out  in  supplication.  There  was 
a  hush  upon  this  place.  The  loud  and  ve- 
hement cry  of  the  shadoof-man  died 
away.  The  sakieh  droned  in  my  ears  no 
more  like  distant  Sicilian  pipes  playing 

at  Natale.    I  felt  a  breath  from  the  desert. 

« 

And,  indeed,  the  desert  was  near — that 
realistic  desert  which  suggests  to  the 
traveller  approaches  to  the  sea,  so  that 
beyond  each  pallid  dune,  as  he  draws 
near  it,  he  half  expects  to  hear  the  lap- 
ping of  the  waves.  Presently,  when,  hav- 
ing ascended  that  marvellous  staircase 


58  DENDERAH 

of  the  New  Year,  walking  in  procession 
with  the  priests  upon  its  walls  toward  the 
rays  of  Ra,  I  came  out  upon  the  temple 
roof,  and  looked  upon  the  desert — upon 
sheeny  sands,  almost  like  slopes  of  satin 
shining  in  the  sun,  upon  paler  sands  in 
the  distance,  holding  an  Arab  campo 
santo,  in  which  rose  the  little  creamy  cu- 
polas of  a  sheikh's  tomb,  surrounded  by 
a  creamy  wall,  those  little  cupolas  gave 
to  me  a  feeling  of  the  real,  the  irresistible 
Africa  such  as  I  had  not  known  since  I 
had  been  in  Egypt ;  and  I  thought  I  heard 
in  the  distance  the  ceaseless  hum  of  pray- 
ing and  praising  voices. 

"  God  hath  rewarded  the  faithful  with 
gardens  through  which  flow  rivulets. 
They  shall  be  for  ever  therein,  and  that  is 
the  reward  of  the  virtuous." 

The  sensation  of  solemnity  which  over- 
took me  as  I  approached  the  temple  deep- 
ened when  I  drew  close  to  it,  when  I  stood 
within  it.  In  the  first  hall,  mighty,  mag- 
nificent, full  of  enormous  columns  from 


DENDERAH  59 

which  faces  of  Hathor  once  looked  to  the 
four  points  of  the  compass,  I  found  only 
one  face  almost  complete,  saved  from  the 
fury  of  fanatics  by  the  protection  of  the 
goddess  of  chance,  in  whom  the  modern 
Egyptian  so  implicitly  believes.  In  shape 
it  was  a  delicate  oval.  In  the  long  eyes, 
about  the  brow,  the  cheeks,  there  was  a 
strained  expression  that  suggested  to  me 
more  than  a  gravity — almost  an  anguish 
— of  spirit.  As  I  looked  at  it,  I  thought 
of  Eleanora  Duse.  Was  this  the  ideal  of 
joy  in  the  time  of  the  Ptolemies?  Joy 
may  be  rapturous,  or  it  may  be  serene; 
but  could  it  ever  be  like  this?  The  pale, 
delicious  blue  that  here  and  there,  in  tiny 
sections,  broke  the  almost  haggard,  grey- 
ish whiteness  of  this  first  hall  with  the 
roof  of  black,  like  bits  of  an  evening  sky 
seen  through  tiny  window-slits  in  a  som- 
bre room,  suggested  joy,  was  joy  summed 
up  in  color.  But  Hathor's  face  was  weari- 
ful and  sad. 
From  the  gloom  of  the  inner  halls  came 


60  DENDERAH 

a  sound,  loud,  angry,  menacing,  as  I 
walked  on,  a  sound  of  menace  and  an 
odor,  heavy  and  deathlike.  Only  in  the 
first  hall  had  those  builders  and  decora- 
tors of  two  thousand  years  ago  been 
moved  by  their  conception  of  the  goddess 
to  hail  her,  to  worship  her,  with  the  pur- 
ity of  white,  with  the  sweet  gaiety  of  tur- 
cjuoise.  Or  so  it  seems  to-day,  when  the 
passion  of  Christianity  against  Hathor  has 
spent  itself  and  died.  Now  Christians 
come  to  seek  what  Christian  Copts  de- 
stroyed; wander  through  the  deserted 
courts,  desirous  of  looking  upon  the  faces 
that  have  long  since  been  hacked  to  pieces. 
A  more  benign  spirit  informs  our  world, 
but,  alas!  Hathor  has  been  sacrificed  to 
the  deviltries  of  old.  And  it  is  well,  per- 
haps, that  her  temple  should  be  sad,  like 
a  place  of  silent  waiting  for  the  glories 
that  are  gone. 

With  every  step  my  melancholy  grew. 
Encompassed  by  gloomy  odors,  assailed 
by  the  clamour  of  gigantic  bats,  which 


DENDERAH  61 

flew  furiously  among  the  monstrous  pil- 
lars near  a  roof  ominous  as  a  storm-cloud, 
my  spirit  was  haunted  by  the  sad  eyes  of 
Hathor,  which  gaze  for  ever  from  that 
column  in  the  first  hall.  Were  they  al- 
ways like  that?  Once  that  face  dwelt 
with  a  crowd  of  worship.  And  all  the 
other  faces  have  gone,  and  all  the  glory 
has  passed.  And,  like  so  many  of  the 
living,  the  goddess  has  paid  for  her  splen- 
dors. The  pendulum  swung,  and  where 
men  adored,  men  hated  her — her  the  god- 
dess of  love  and  loveliness.  And  as  the 
human  face  changes  when  terror  and  sor- 
row come,  I  felt  as  if  Hathor's  face  of 
stone  had  changed  upon  its  column,  look- 
ing toward  the  Nile,  in  obedience  to  the 
anguish  in  her  heart ;  I  felt  as  if  Denderah 
were  a  majestic  house  of  grief.  So  I 
must  always  think  of  it,  dark,  tragic,  and 
superb.  The  Egyptians  once  believed  that 
when  death  came  to  a  man,  the  soul  of 
him,  which  they  called  the  Ba,  winged  its 
way  to  the  gods,  but  that,  moved  by  a 


62  DENDERAH 

sweet  unselfishness,  it  returned  some  time 
to  his  tomb,  to  give  comfort  to  the  poor, 
deserted  mummy.  Upon  the  lids  of  sar- 
cophagi it  is  sometimes  represented  as  a 
bird,  flying  down  to,  or  resting  upon,  the 
mummy.  As  I  went  onward  in  the  dark- 
ness, among  the  columns,  over  the  blocks 
of  stone  that  form  the  pavements,  seeing 
vaguely  the  sacred  boats  upon  the  walls, 
Horus  and  Thoth,  the  king  before  Osiris ; 
as  I  mounted  and  descended  with  the 
priests  to  roof  and  floor,  I  longed,  instead 
of  the  clamour  of  the  bats,  to  hear  the 
light  flutter  of  the  soft  wings  of  the  Ba 
of  Hathor,  flying  from  Paradise  to  this 
sad  temple  of  the  desert  to  bring  her  com- 
fort in  the  gloom.  I  thought  of  her  as 
a  poor  woman,  suffering  as  only  women 
can  in  loneliness. 

In  the  museum  at  Cairo  there  is  the 
mummy  of  "  the  lady  Amanit,  priestess 
of  Hathor."  She  lies  there  upon  her  back, 
with  her  thin  body  slightly  turned  toward 
the  left  side,  as  if  in  an  effort  to  change 


DENDERAH  63 

her  position.  Her  head  is  completely 
turned  to  the  same  side.  Her  mouth  is 
wide  open,  showing  all  the  teeth.  The 
tongue  is  lolling  out.  Upon  the  head  the 
thin,  brown  hair  makes  a  line  above  the 
little  ear,  and  is  mingled  at  the  back  of 
the  head  with  false  tresses.  Round  the 
neck  is  a  mass  of  ornaments,  of  amulets 
and  beads.  The  right  arm  and  hand  lie 
along  the  body.  The  expression  of  "  the 
lady  Amanit "  is  very  strange,  and  very 
subtle ;  for  it  combines  horror — which  im- 
plies activity — with  a  profound,  an  im- 
penetrable repose,  far  beyond  the  reach 
of  all  disturbance.  In  the  temple  of  Den- 
derah  I  fancied  the  lady  Amanit  minister- 
ing sadly,  even  terribly,  to  a  lonely  god- 
dess, moving  in  fear  through  an  eternal 
gloom,  dying  at  last  there,  overwhelmed 
by  tasks  too  heavy  for  that  tiny  body, 
the  ultra-sensitive  spirit  that  inhabited 
it.  And  now  she  sleeps — one  feels 
that,  as  one  gazes  at  the  mummy 
— very  profoundly,  though  not  yet  very 


64  DENDERAH 

calmly,  the  lady  Amanit.  But  her 
goddess — still  she  wakes  upon  her  col- 
umn. 

When  I  came  out  at  last  into  the  sun- 
light of  the  growing  day,  I  circled  the 
temple,  skirting  its  gigantic,  corniced 
walls,  from  which  at  intervals  the  heads 
and  paws  of  resting  lions  protrude,  to  see 
another  woman  whose  fame  for  loveliness 
and  seduction  is  almost  as  legendary  as 
Aphrodite's.  It  is  fitting  enough  that 
Cleopatra's  form  should  be  graven  upon 
the  temple  of  Hathor;  fitting,  also,  that 
though  I  found  her  in  the  presence  of 
deities,  and  in  the  company  of  her  son, 
Csesarion,  her  face,  which  is  in  profile, 
should  have  nothing  of  Hathor's  sad  im- 
pressiveness.  This,  no  doubt,  is  not  the 
real  Cleopatra.  Nevertheless,  this  face 
suggests  a  certain  self-complacent  cruelty 
and  sensuality  essentially  human,  and  ut- 
terly detached  from  all  divinity,  whereas 
in  the  face  of  the  goddess  there  is  a  some- 
thing remote,  and  even  distantly  intellec- 


DENDERAH  65 

tual,  which  calls  the  imagination  to  "  the 
fields  beyond." 

As  I  rode  back  toward  the  river,  I  saw 
again  the  boy  clad  in  the  rope  of  plaited 
grass,  and  again  he  said,  less  shyly,  "  May 
your  day  be  happy !  "  It  was  a  kindly 
wish.  In  the  dawn  I  had  felt  it  to  be  al- 
most a  prophecy.  But  now  I  was  haunted 
by  the  face  of  the  goddess  of  Denderah, 
and  I  remembered  the  legend  of  the  lovely 
Lais,  who,  when  she  began  to  age,  cov- 
ered herself  from  the  eyes  of  men  with  a 
veil,  and  went  every  day  at  evening  to 
look  upon  her  statue,  in  which  the  genius 
of  Praxiteles  had  rendered  permanent  the 
beauty  the  woman  could  not  keep.  One 
evening,  hanging  to  the  statue's  pedestal 
by  a  garland  of  red  roses,  the  sculptor 
found  a  mirror,  upon  the  polished  disk  of 
which  were  traced  these  words: 

"  Lais,  O  Goddess,  consecrates  to  thee 
her  mirror:  no  longer  able  to  see  there 
what  she  was,  she  will  not  see  there  what 
she  has  become." 


66  DENDERAH 

My  Hathor  of  Denderah,  the  sad-eyed 
dweller  on  the  column  in  the  first  hall,  had 
she  a  mirror,  would  surely  hang  it,  as  Lais 
hung  hers,  at  the  foot  of  the  pedestal  of 
the  Egyptian  Aphrodite;  had  she  a  veil, 
would  surely  cover  the  face  that,  solitary 
among  the  cruel  evidences  of  Christian 
ferocity,  silently  says  to  the  gloomy 
courts,  to  the  shining  desert  and  the  Nile : 

"  Once  I  was  worshipped,  but  I  am 
worshipped  no  longer." 


KARNAK 


VII 
KARNAK 

BUILDINGS  have  personalities.  Some  fas- 
cinate as  beautiful  women  fascinate ;  some 
charm  as  a  child  may  charm,  naively, 
simply,  but  irresistibly.  Some,  like  con- 
querors, men  of  blood  and  iron,  without 
bowels  of  mercy,  pitiless  and  determined, 
strike  awe  to  the  soul,  mingled  with  the 
almost  gasping  admiration  that  power 
wakes  in  man.  Some  bring  a  sense  of 
heavenly  peace  to  the  heart.  Some,  like 
certain  temples  of  the  Greeks,  by  their 
immense  dignity,  speak  to  the  nature  al- 
most as  music  speaks,  and  change  anxiety 
to  trust.  Some  tug  at  the  hidden  chords 
of  romance  and  rouse  a  trembling  re- 
sponse. Some  seem  to  be  mingling  their 

tears  with  the  tears  of  the  dead;  some 
69 


70  KARNAK 

their  laughter  with  the  laughter  of  the 
living.  The  traveller,  sailing  up  the  Nile, 
holds  intercourse  with  many  of  these  dif- 
ferent personalities.  He  is  sad,  perhaps, 
as  I  was  with  Denderah;  dreams  in  the 
sun  with  Abydos;  muses  with  Luxor  be- 
neath the  little,  tapering  minaret  whence 
the  call  to  prayer  drops  down  to  be  an- 
swered by  the  angelus  bell;  falls  into  a 
reverie  in  the  "  thinking  place  "  of  Ram- 
eses  II.,  near  to  the  giant  that  was  once 
the  mightiest  of  all  Egyptian  statues; 
eagerly  wakes  to  the  fascination  of  rec- 
ord at  Deir-el-Bahari ;  worships  in  Edfu; 
by  Philae  is  carried  into  a  realm  of  deli- 
cate magic,  where  engineers  are  not. 
Each  prompts  him  to  a  different  mood; 
each  wakes  in  his  nature  a  different  re- 
sponse. And  at  Karnak  what  is  he? 
What  mood  enfolds  him  there  ?  Is  he  sad, 
thoughtful,  awed,  or  gay? 

An  old  lady  in  a  helmet,  and  other 
things  considered  no  doubt  by  her  as 
suited  to  Egypt  rather  than  to  herself, 


KARNAK  71 

remarked  in  my  hearing,  with  a  Scotch 
accent  and  an  air  of  summing  up,  that 
Karnak  was  "  very  nice  indeed."  There 
she  was  wrong — Scotch  and  wrong.  Kar- 
nak is  not  nice.  No  temple  that  I  have 
seen  upon  the  banks  of  the  Nile  is  nice. 
And  Karnak  cannot  be  summed  up  in  a 
phrase  or  in  many  phrases;  cannot  even 
be  adequately  described  in  few  or  many 
words. 

Long  ago  I  saw  it  lighted  up  with  col- 
ored fires  one  night  for  the  Khedive,  its 
ravaged  magnificence  tinted  with  rose 
and  livid  green  and  blue,  its  pylons  glit- 
tering with  artificial  gold,  its  population 
of  statues,  its  obelisks,  and  columns, 
changing  from  things  of  dreams  to  things 
of  day,  from  twilight  marvels  to  shadowy 
spectres,  and  from  these  to  hard  and 
piercing  realities  at  the  cruel  will  of  pig- 
mies crouching  by  its  walls.  Now,  after 
many  years,  I  saw  it  first  quietly  by 
moonlight  after  watching  the  sunset  from 
the  summit  of  the  great  pylon.  That  was 


72  KARNAK 

a  pageant  worth  more  than  the  Khedive's. 
I  was  in  the  air;  had  something  of  the 
released  feeling  I  have  often  known  upon 
the  tower  of  Biskra,  looking  out  toward 
evening  to  the  Sahara  spaces.  But  here 
I  was  not  confronted  with  an  immensity 
of  nature,  but  with  a  gleaming  river  and 
an  immensity  of  man.  Beneath  me  was 
the  native  village,  in  the  heart  of  daylight 
dusty  and  unkempt,  but  now  becoming 
charged  with  velvety  beauty,  with  the 
soft  and  heavy  mystery  that  at  evening  is 
born  among  great  palm-trees.  Along  the 
path  that  led  from  it,  coming  toward  the 
avenue  of  sphinxes  with  ram's-heads  that 
watch  for  ever  before  the  temple  door, 
a  great  white  camel  stepped,  its  rider  a 
tiny  child  with  a  close,  white  cap  upon  his 
head.  The  child  was  singing  to  the  glory 
of  the  sunset,  or  was  it  to  the  glory  of 
Amun,  "  the  hidden  one,"  once  the  local 
god  of  Thebes,  to  whom  the  grandest  tem- 
ple in  the  world  was  dedicated?  I  listen 
to  the  childish,  quavering  voice,  twitter- 


KARNAK  73 

ing  almost  like  a  bird,  and  one  word  alone 
came  up  to  me — the  word  one  hears  in 
Egypt  from  all  the  lips  that  speak  and 
sing:  from  the  Nubians  round  their  fires 
at  night,  from  the  lithe  boatmen  of  the 
lower  reaches  of  the  Nile,  from  the  Be- 
douins of  the  desert,  and  the  donkey  boys 
of  the  villages,  from  the  sheikh  who  reads 
one's  future  in  water  spilt  on  a  plate,  and 
the  Bisharin  with  buttered  curls  who  runs 
to  sell  one  beads  from  his  tent  among  the 
sand-dunes. 

"  Allah !  "  the  child  was  singing  as  he 
passed  upon  his  way. 

Pigeons  circled  above  their  pretty  tow- 
ers. The  bats  came  out,  as  if  they  knew 
how  precious  is  their  black  at  evening 
against  the  ethereal  lemon  color,  the  or- 
ange and  the  red.  The  little  obelisk  be- 
yond the  last  sphinx  on  the  left  began  to 
change,  as  in  Egypt  all  things  change  at 
sunset — pylon  and  dusty  bush,  colossus 
and  baked  earth  hovel,  sycamore,  and 
tamarisk,  statue  and  trotting  donkey.  It 


74  KARNAK 

looked  like  a  mysterious  finger  pointed  in 
warning  toward  the  sky.  The  Nile  began 
to  gleam.  Upon  its  steel  and  silver  torches 
of  amber  flame  were  lighted.  The  Libyan 
mountains  became  spectral  beyond  the 
tombs  of  the  kings.  The  tiny,  rough  cu- 
polas that  mark  a  grave  close  to  the 
sphinxes,  in  daytime  dingy  and  poor,  now 
seemed  made  of  some  splendid  material 
worthy  to  roof  the  mummy  of  a  king. 
Far  off  a  pool  of  the  Nile,  that  from  here 
looked  like  a  little  palm-fringed  lake, 
turned  ruby-red.  The  flags  from  the 
standard  of  Luxor,  among  the  minarets, 
flew  out  straight  against  a  sky  that  was 
pale  as  a  primrose,  almost  cold  in  its  amaz- 
ing delicacy. 

I  turned,  and  behind  me  the  moon  was 
risen.  Already  its  silver  rays  fell  upon 
the  ruins  of  Karnak;  upon  the  thickets  of 
lotus  columns;  upon  solitary  gateways 
that  now  give  entrance  to  no  courts ;  upon 
the  sacred  lake,  with  its  reeds,  where  the 
black  water-fowl  were  asleep;  upon  slop- 


KARNAK  75 

ing  walls,  shored  up  by  enormous  stanch- 
ions, like  ribs  of  some  prehistoric  levia- 
than; upon  small  chambers;  upon  fallen 
blocks  of  masonry,  fragments  of  archi- 
trave and  pavement,  of  capital  and  cor- 
nice; and  upon  the  people  of  Karnak — 
those  fascinating  people  who  still  cling  to 
their  habitation  in  the  ruins,  faithful 
through  misfortune,  affectionate  with  a 
steadfastness  that  defies  the  cruelty  of 
Time;  upon  the  little,  lonely  white  sphinx 
with  the  woman's  face  and  the  downward- 
sloping  eyes  full  of  sleepy  seduction; 
upon  Rameses  II.,  with  the  face  of  a 
kindly  child,  not  of  a  king;  upon  the 
sphinx,  bereft  of  its  companion,  which 
crouches  before  the  kiosk  of  Taharga,  the 
King  of  Ethiopia;  upon  those  two  who 
stand  together  as  if  devoted,  yet  by  their 
attitudes  seem  to  express  characters  di- 
ametrically opposed,  grey  men  and  vivid, 
the  one  with  folded  arms  calling  to  Peace, 
the  other  with  arms  stretched  down  in 
a  gesture  of  crude  determination,  sum- 


76  KARNAK 

moning  War,  as  if  from  the  underworld ; 
upon  the  granite  foot  and  ankle  in  the 
temple  of  Rameses  III.,  which  in  their 
perfection,  like  the  headless  Victory  in 
Paris,  and  the  Niobide  Chiaramonti  in 
the  Vatican,  suggest  a  great  personality, 
compose  a  great  personality  that  once  met 
with  is  not  to  be  forgotten:  upon  these 
and  their  companions,  who  would  not  for- 
sake the  halls  and  courts  where  once  they 
dwelt  with  splendor,  where  now  they 
dwell  with  ruin  that  attracts  the  gap- 
ing world.  The  moon  was  risen,  but  the 
west  was  still  full  of  color  and  light.  It 
faded.  There  was  a  pause.  Only  a  bar 
of  dull  red,  holding  a  hint  of  brown,  lay 
where  the  sun  had  sunk.  And  minutes 
passed — minutes  for  me  full  of  silent  ex- 
pectation, while  the  moonlight  grew  a  lit- 
tle stronger,  a  few  more  silver  rays  slipped 
down  upon  the  ruins.  I  turned  toward 
the  east.  And  then  came  that  curious 
crescendo  of  color  and  of  light  which,  in 
Egypt,  succeeds  the  diminuendo  of  color 


KARNAK  77 

and  of  light  that  is  the  prelude  to  the 
pause  before  the  afterglow.  Everything 
seemed  to  be  in  subtle  movement,  heaving 
as  a  breast  heaves  with  the  breath ;  swell- 
ing slightly,  as  if  in  an  effort  to  be  more, 
to  attract  attention,  to  gain  in  significance. 
Pale  things  became  livid,  holding  appar- 
ently some  under-brightness  which  partly 
penetrated  its  envelope,  but  a  brightness 
that  was  white  and  almost  frightful. 
Black  things  seemed  to  glow  with  black- 
ness. The  air  quivered.  Its  silence  surely 
thrilled  with  sound — with  sound  that 
grew  ever  louder. 

In  the  east  I  saw  an  effect.  To  the 
west  I  turned  for  the  cause.  The  sunset 
light  was  returning.  Horus  would  not 
permit  Turn  to  reign  even  for  a  few  brief 
moments,  and  Khuns,  the  sacred  god  of 
the  moon,  would  be  witness  of  a  conflict 
in  that  lovely  western  region  of  the  ocean 
of  the  sky  where  the  bark  of  the  sun  had 
floated  away  beneath  the  mountain  rim 
upon  the  red-and-orange  tides.  The 


78  KARNAK 

afterglow  was  like  an  exquisite  spasm,  is 
always  like  an  exquisite  spasm,  a  beauti- 
ful, almost  desperate  effort  ending  in  the 
quiet  darkness  of  defeat.  And  through 
that  spasmodic  effort  a  world  lived  for 
some  minutes  with  a  life  that  seemed  un- 
real, startling,  magical.  Color  returned 
to  the  sky — color  ethereal,  trembling  as  if 
it  knew  it  ought  not  to  return.  Yet  it 
stayed  for  a  while  and  even  glowed, 
though  it  looked  always  strangely  puri- 
fied, and  full  of  a  crystal  coldness.  The 
birds  that  flew  against  it  were  no  longer 
birds,  but  dark,  moving  ornaments,  de- 
vised surely  by  a  supreme  artist  to  height- 
en here  and  there  the  beauty  of  the  sky. 
Everything  that  moved  against  the  after- 
glow— man,  woman,  child,  camel  and 
donkey,  dog  and  goat,  languishing  buffalo, 
and  plunging  horse — became  at  once  an 
ornament,  invented,  I  fancied,  by  a  genius 
to  emphasize,  by  relieving  it,  the  color  in 
which  the  sky  was  drowned.  And  Khuns 
watched  serenely,  as  if  he  knew  the  end. 


KARNAK  79 

And  almost  suddenly  the  miraculous  ef- 
fort failed.  Things  again  revealed  their 
truth,  whether  commonplace  or  not.  That 
pool  of  the  Nile  was  no  more  a  red  jewel 
set  in  a  feathery  pattern  of  strange  de- 
sign, but  only  water  fading  from  my  sight 
beyond  a  group  of  palms.  And  that  be- 
low me  was  only  a  camel  going  homeward, 
and  that  a  child  leading  a  bronze-colored 
sheep  with  a  curly  coat,  and  that  a  dusty, 
flat-roofed  hovel,  not  the  fairy  home  of 
jinn,  or  the  abode  of  some  magician  work- 
ing marvels  with  the  sun-rays  he  had 
gathered  in  his  net.  The  air  was  no 
longer  thrilling  with  music.  The  breast 
that  had  heaved  with  a  divine  breath  was 
still  as  the  breast  of  a  corpse. 

And  Khuns  reigned  quietly  over  the 
plains  of  Karnak. 

Karnak  has  no  distinctive  personality. 
Built  under  many  kings,  its  ruins  are  as 
complex  as  were  probably  once  its  com- 
pleted temples,  with  their  shrines,  their 
towers,  their  courts,  their  hypo-style  halls. 


8o  KARNAK 

As  I  looked  down  that  evening  in  the 
moonlight  I  saw,  softened  and  made  more 
touching  than  in  day-time,  those  alluring 
complexities,  brought  by  the  night  and 
Khuns  into  a  unity  that  was  both  tender 
and  superb.  Masses  of  masonry  lay 
jumbled  in  shadow  and  in  silver ;  gigantic 
walls  cast  sharply  defined  gloom ;  obelisks 
pointed  significantly  to  the  sky,  seeming, 
as  they  always  do,  to  be  murmuring  a 
message;  huge  doorways  stood  up  like 
giants  unafraid  of  their  loneliness  and 
yet  pathetic  in  it;  here  was  a  watching 
statue,  there  one  that  seemed  to  sleep, 
seen  from  afar.  Yonder  Queen  Hat- 
shepsu,  who  wrought  wonders  at  Deir-el- 
Bahari,  and  who  is  more  familiar  per- 
haps as  Hatasu,  had  left  her  traces,  and 
nearer,  to  the  right,  Rameses  III.  had 
made  a  temple,  surely  for  the  birds,  so 
fond  they  are  of  it,  so  pertinaciously  they 
haunt  it.  Rameses  II.,  mutilated  and  im- 
mense, stood  on  guard  before  the  terrific 
hall  of  Seti  I. ;  and  between  him  and  my 


KARNAK  81 

platform  in  the  air  rose  the  solitary  lotus 
column  that  prepares  you  for  the  wonder 
of  Seti's  hall,  which  otherwise  might  al- 
most everwhelm  you — unless  you  are  a 
Scotch  lady  in  a  helmet.  And  Khuns  had 
his  temple  here  by  the  Sphinx  of  the 
twelfth  Rameses,  and  Ptah,  who  created 
"  the  sun  egg  and  the  moon  egg,"  and 
who  was  said — only  said,  alas ! —  to  have 
established  on  earth  the  "  everlasting  jus- 
tice," had  his,  and  still  their  stones  re- 
ceive the  silver  moon-rays  and  wake  the 
wonder  of  men.  Thothmes  III.,  Thoth- 
mes  I.,  Shishak,  who  smote  the  kneeling 
prisoners  and  vanquished  Jeroboam,  Me- 
damut  and  Mut,  Amenhotep  I.,  and 
Amenhotep  II. — all  have  left  their  rec- 
ords or  been  celebrated  at  Karnak.  Pur- 
posely I  mingled  them  in  my  mind — did 
not  attempt  to  put  them  in  their  proper 
order,  or  even  to  disentangle  gods  and 
goddesses  from  conquerors  and  kings.  In 
the  warm  and  seductive  night  Khuns 
whispered  to  me :  "  As  long  ago  at  Bekh- 


82  KARNAK 

ten  I  exorcised  the  demon  from  the  suf- 
fering Princess,  so  now  I  exorcise  from 
these  ruins  all  spirits  but  my  own.  To- 
night these  ruins  shall  suggest  nothing 
but  majesty,  tranquillity,  and  beauty. 
Their  records  are  for  Ra,  and  must  be 
studied  by  his  rays.  In  mine  they  shall 
speak  not  to  the  intellect,  but  only  to  the 
emotions  and  the  soul." 

And  presently  I  went  down,  and  yield- 
ing a  complete  and  happy  obedience  to 
Khuns,  I  wandered  alone  through-  the  stu- 
pendous vestiges  of  past  eras,  dead  ambi- 
tions, vanished  glory,  and  long-outworn 
belief,  and  I  ignored  eras,  ambitions, 
glory,  and  belief,  and  thought  only  of 
form,  and  height,  of  the  miracle  of  black- 
ness against  silver,  and  of  the  pathos  of 
statues  whose  ever-open  eyes  at  night, 
when  one  is  near  them,  suggest  the  work- 
ing of  some  evil  spell,  perpetual  watch- 
fulness, combined  with  eternal  inactivity, 
the  unslumbering  mind  caged  in  the  body 
that  is  paralysed. 


KARNAK  83 

There  is  a  temple  at  Karnak  that  I 
love,  and  I  scarcely  know  why  I  care  for 
it  so  much.  It  is  on  the  right  of  the  soli- 
tary lotus  column  before  you  come  to  the 
terrific  hall  of  Seti.  Some  people  pass 
it  by,  having  but  little  time,  and  being 
hypnotized,  it  seems,  by  the  more  astound- 
ing ruin  that  lies  beyond  it.  And  perhaps 
it  would  be  well,  on  a  first  visit,  to  enter 
it  last ;  to  let  its  influence  be  the  final  one 
to  rest  upon  your  spirit.  This  is  the  tem- 
ple of  Rameses  III.,  a  brown  place  of 
calm  and  retirement,  an  ineffable  place  of 
peace.  Yes,  though  the  birds  love  it  and 
fill  it  often  with  their  voices,  it  is  a  sanc- 
tuary of  peace.  Upon  the  floor  the  soft 
sand  lies,  placing  silence  beneath  your 
footsteps.  The  pale  brown  of  walls  and 
columns,  almost  yellow  in  the  sunshine, 
is  delicate  and  soothing,  and  inclines  the 
heart  to  calm.  Delicious,  suggestive  of  a 
beautiful  tapestry,  rich  and  ornate,  yet 
always  quiet,  are  the  brown  reliefs  upon 
the  stone.  What  are  they  ?  Does  it  mat- 


84  KARNAK 

ter?  They  soften  the  walls,  make  them 
more  personal,  more  tender.  That  surely 
is  their  mission.  This  temple  holds  for 
me  a  spell.  As  soon  as  I  enter  it,  I  feel 
the  touch  of  the  lotus,  as  if  an  invisible 
and  kindly  hand  swept  a  blossom  lightly 
across  my  face  and  downward  to  my 
heart.  This  courtyard,  these  small  cham- 
bers beyond  it,  that  last  doorway  fram- 
ing a  lovely  darkness,  soothe  me  even 
more  than  the  terra-cotta  hermitages  of 
the  Certosa  of  Pavia.  And  all  the  stat- 
ues here  are  calm  with  an  irrevocable 
calmness,  faithful  through  passing  years 
with  a  very  sober  faithfulness  to  the  tem- 
ple they  adorn.  In  no  other  place,  one 
feels  it,  could  they  be  thus  at  peace,  with 
hands  crossed  for  ever  upon  their  breasts, 
which  are  torn  by  no  anxieties,  thrilled 
by  no  joys.  As  one  stands  among  them, 
or  sitting  on  the  base  of  a  column  in  the 
chamber  that  lies  beyond  them,  looks  on 
them  from  a  little  distance,  their  atti- 
tude is  like  a  summons  to  men  to  con- 


KARNAK  85 

tend  no  more,  to  be  still,  to  enter  into 
rest. 

Come  to  this  temple  when  you  leave  the 
hall  of  Seti.  There  you  are  in  a  place  of 
triumph.  Scarlet,  some  say,  is  the  color 
of  a  great  note  sounded  on  a  bugle.  This 
hall  is  like  a  bugle-call  of  the  past,  thrill- 
ing even  now  down  all  the  ages  with  a 
triumph  that  is  surely  greater  than  any 
other  triumphs.  It  suggests  blaze — blaze 
of  scarlet,  blaze  of  bugle,  blaze  of  glory, 
blaze  of  life  and  time,  of  ambition  and 
achievement.  In  these  columns,  in  the 
putting  up  of  them,  dead  men  sought  to 
climb  to  sun  and  stars,  limitless  in  desire, 
limitless  in  industry,  limitless  in  will.  And 
at  the  tops  of  the  columns  blooms  the  lo- 
tus, the  symbol  of  rising.  What  a  tri- 
umph in  stone  this  hall  was  once,  what  a 
triumph  in  stone  its  ruin  is  to-day!  Per- 
haps, among  temples,  it  is  the  most  won- 
drous thing  in  all  Egypt,  as  it  was,  no 
doubt,  the  most  wondrous  temple  in  the 
world;  among  temples  I  say,  for  the 


86  KARNAK 

Sphinx  is  of  all  the  marvels  of  Egypt  by 
far  the  most  marvellous.  The  grandeur 
of  this  hall  almost  moves  one  to  tears, 
like  the  marching  past  of  conquerors,  stirs 
the  heart  with  leaping  thrills  at  the  ca- 
pacities of  men.  Through  the  thicket  of 
columns,  tall  as  forest  trees,  the  intense 
blue  of  the  African  sky  stares  down,  and 
their  great  shadows  lie  along  the  warm 
and  sunlit  ground.  Listen!  There  are 
voices  chanting.  Men  are  working  here — 
working  as  men  worked  how  many  thou- 
sands of  years  ago.  But  these  are  call- 
ing upon  the  Mohammedan's  god  as  they 
slowly  drag  to  the  appointed  places  the 
mighty  blocks  of  stone.  And  it  is  to-day 
a  Frenchman  who  oversees  them. 

"Help!  Help!  Allah  give  us  help! 
Help!  Help!  Allah  give  us  help!" 

The  dust  flies  up  about  their  naked 
feet.  Triumph  and  work ;  work  succeeded 
by  the  triumph  all  can  see.  I  like  to  hear 
the  workmen's  voices  within  the  hall  of 


KARNAK  87 

Seti.  I  like  to  see  the  dust  stirred  by 
their  tramping  feet. 

And  then  I  like  to  go  once  more  to  the 
little  temple,  to  enter  through  its  defaced 
gateway,  to  stand  alone  in  its  silence  be- 
tween the  rows  of  statues  with  their  arms 
folded  upon  their  quiet  breasts,  to  gaze 
into  the  tender  darkness  beyond — the 
darkness  that  looks  consecrated — to  feel 
that  peace  is  more  wonderful  than  tri- 
umph, that  the  end  of  things  is  peace. 

Triumph  and  deathless  peace,  the 
bugle-call  and  silence — these  are  the  notes 
of  Karnak. 


LUXOR 


VIII 
LUXOR 

UPON  the  wall  of  the  great  court  of 
Amenhotep  III.  in  the  temple  of  Luxor 
there  is  a  delicious  dancing  procession  in 
honor  of  Rameses  II.  It  is  very  funny 
and  very  happy;  full  of  the  joy  of  life — 
a  sort  of  radiant  cake-walk  of  old  Egyp- 
tian days.  How  supple  are  these  dancers ! 
They  seem  to  have  no  bones.  One  after 
another  they  come  in  line  upon  the  mighty 
wall,  and  each  one  bends  backward  to 
the  knees  of  the  one  who  follows.  As  I 
stood  and  looked  at  them  for  the  first  time, 
almost  I  heard  the  twitter  of  flutes,  the 
rustic  wail  of  the  African  hautboy,  the 
monotonous  boom  of  the  derabukkeh,  cries 
of  a  far-off  gaiety  such  as  one  often  hears 
from  the  Nile  by  night.  But  these  cries 


92  LUXOR 

came  down  the  long  avenues  of  the  cen- 
turies ;  this  gaiety  was  distant  in  the  vasty 
halls  of  the  long-dead  years.  Never  can 
I  think  of  Luxor  without  thinking  of 
those  happy  dancers,  without  thinking  of 
the  life  that  goes  in  the  sun  on  dancing 
feet. 

There  are  a  few  places  in  the  world 
that  one  associates  with  happiness,  that 
one  remembers  always  with  a  smile,  a  lit- 
tle thrill  at  the  heart  that  whispers  "  There 
joy  is."  Of  these  few  places  Luxor  is 
one — Luxor  the  home  of  sunshine,  the 
suave  abode  of  light,  of  warmth,  of  the 
sweet  days  of  gold  and  sheeny,  golden 
sunsets,  of  silver,  shimmering  nights 
through  which  the  songs  of  the  boatmen 
of  the  Nile  go  floating  to  the  courts  and 
the  tombs  of  Thebes.  The  roses  bloom 
in  Luxor  under  the  mighty  palms.  Always 
surely  beneath  the  palms  there  are  the 
roses.  And  the  lateen-sails  come  up  the 
Nile,  looking  like  white-winged  promises 
of  future  golden  days.  And  at  dawn  one 


LUXOR  93 

wakes  with  hope  and  hears  the  songs  of 
the  dawn ;  and  at  noon  one  dreams  of  the 
happiness  to  come;  and  at  sunset  one  is 
swept  away  on  the  gold  into  the  heart 
of  the  golden  world;  and  at  night  one 
looks  at  the  stars,  and  each  star  is  a  twink- 
ling hope.  Soft  are  the  airs  of  Luxor; 
there  is  no  harshness  in  the  wind  that 
stirs  the  leaves  of  the  palms.  And  the 
land  is  steeped  in  light.  From  Luxor  one 
goes  with  regret.  One  returns  to  it  with 
joy  on  dancing  feet. 

One  day  I  sat  in  the  temple,  in  the  huge 
court  with  the  great  double  row  of  col- 
umns that  stands  on  the  banks  of  the  Nile 
and  looks  so  splendid  from  it.  The  pale 
brown  of  the  stone  became  almost  yellow 
in  the  sunshine.  From  the  river,  hidden 
from  me,  stole  up  the  songs  of  the  boat- 
men. Nearer  at  hand  I  heard  pigeons 
cooing,  cooing  in  the  sun,  as  if  almost 
too  glad,  and  seeking  to  manifest  their 
gladness.  Behind  me,  through  the  col- 
umns, peeped  some  houses  of  the  village: 


94  LUXOR 

the  white  home  of  Ibrahim  Ayyad,  the 
perfect  dragoman,  grandson  of  Mustapha 
Aga,  who  entertained  me  years  ago,  and 
whose  house  stood  actually  within  the 
precincts  of  the  temple;  houses  of  other 
fortunate  dwellers  in  Luxor  whose  names 
I  do  not  know.  For  the  village  of  Luxor 
crowds  boldly  about  the  temple,  and  the 
children  play  in  the  dust  almost  at  the 
foot  of  obelisks  and  statues.  High  on  a 
brown  hump  of  earth  a  buffalo  stood 
alone,  languishing  serenely  in  the  sun, 
gazing  at  me  through  the  columns  with 
light  eyes  that  were  full  of  a  sort  of  folly 
of  contentment.  Some  goats  tripped  by, 
brown  against  the  brown  stone — the  dark 
brown  earth  of  the  native  houses.  Inti- 
mate life  was  here,  striking  the  note  of 
the  coziness  of  Luxor.  Here  was  none 
of  the  sadness  and  the  majesty  of  Den- 
derah.  Grand  are  the  ruins  of  Luxor, 
noble  is  the  line  of  columns  that  boldly 
fronts  the  Nile ;  but  Time  has  given  them 
naked  to  the  air  and  to  the  sun,  to  chil- 


LUXOR  95 

dren  and  to  animals.  Instead  of  bats, 
the  pigeons  fly  about  them.  There  is  no 
dreadful  darkness  in  their  sanctuaries. 
Before  them  the  life  of  the  river,  behind 
them  the  life  of  the  village  flows  and  stirs. 
Upon  them  looks  down  the  Minaret  of 
Abu  Haggag;  and  as  I  sat  in  the  sun- 
shine, the  warmth  of  which  began  to  les- 
sen, I  saw  upon  its  lofty  circular  balcony 
the  figure  of  the  muezzin.  He  leaned 
over,  bending  toward  the  temple  and  the 
statues  of  Rameses  II.  and  the  happy 
dancers  on  the  wall.  He  opened  his  lips 
and  cried  to  them: 

"  God  is  great.  God  is  great  .  .  . 
I  bear  witness  that  there  is  no  god  but 
God.  ...  I  bear  witness  that  Mo- 
hammed is  the  Apostle  of  God 

Come  to  prayer !  Come  to  prayer !  .  .  . 
God  is  great.  God  is  great.  There  is 
no  god  but  God." 

He  circled  round  the  minaret.  He  cried 
to  the  Nile.  He  cried  to  the  Colossi  sit- 
ting in  their  plain,  and  to  the  yellow  preci- 


96  LUXOR 

pices  of  the  mountains  of  Libya.  He  cried 
to  Egypt: 

"  Come  to  prayer !  Come  to  prayer ! 
There  is  no  god  but  God.  There  is  no 
god  but  God." 

The  days  of  the  gods  were  dead,  and 
their  ruined  temple  echoed  with  the  proc- 
lamation of  the  one  God  of  the  Moslem 
world.  "  Come  to  prayer !  Come  to 
prayer ! "  The  sun  began  to  sink. 

"  Sunset  and  evening  star,  and  one  clear  call 
for  me." 

The  voice  of  the  muezzin  died  away. 
There  was  a  silence;  and  then,  as  if  in 
answer  to  the  cry  from  the  minaret,  I 
heard  the  chime  of  the  angelus  bell  from 
the  Catholic  church  of  Luxor. 

"Twilight  and  evening  bell,  and  after  that  the 
dark." 

I  sat  very  still.  The  light  was  fading ; 
all  the  yellow  was  fading,  too,  from  the 


LUXOR  97 

columns  and  the  temple  walls.  I  stayed 
till  it  was  dark;  and  with  the  dark  the 
old  gods  seemed  to  resume  their  inter- 
rupted sway.  And  surely  they,  too,  called 
to  prayer.  For  do  not  these  ruins  of  old 
Egypt,  like  the  muezzin  upon  the  minaret, 
like  the  angelus  bell  in  the  church  tower, 
call  one  to  prayer  in  the  night?  So  won- 
derful are  they  under  stars  and  moon  that 
they  stir  the  fleshly  and  the  worldly  de- 
sires that  lie  like  drifted  leaves  about  the 
reverence  and  the  aspiration  that  are  the 
hidden  core  of  the  heart.  And  it  is  re- 
leased from  its  burden;  and  it  awakes 
and  prays. 

Amun-Ra,  Mut,  and  Khuns,  the  king 
of  the  gods,  his  wife,  mother  of  gods,  and 
the  moon  god,  were  the  Theban  triad  to 
whom  the  holy  buildings  of  Thebes  on  the 
two  banks  of  the  Nile  were  dedicated; 
and  this  temple  of  Luxor,  the  "  House  of 
Amun  in  the  Southern  Apt,"  was  built 
fifteen  hundred  years  before  Christ  by 
Amenhotep  III.  Rameses  II.,  that  ve- 


98  LUXOR 

hement  builder,  added  to  it  immensely. 
One  walks  among  his  traces  when  one 
walks  in  Luxor.  And  here,  as  at  Den- 
derah,  Christians  have  let  loose  the  fury 
that  should  have  had  no  place  in  their  re- 
ligion. Churches  for  their  worship  they 
made  in  different  parts  of  the  temple,  and 
when  they  were  not  praying,  they  broke 
in  pieces  statues,  defaced  bas-reliefs,  and 
smashed  up  shrines  with  a  vigor  quite 
as  great  as  that  displayed  in  preservation 
by  Christians  of  to-day.  Now  time  has 
called  a  truce.  Safe  are  the  statues  that 
are  left.  And  day  by  day  two  great  re- 
ligions, almost  as  if  in  happy  brotherly 
love,  send  forth  their  summons  by  the 
temple  walls.  And  just  beyond  those 
walls,  upon  the  hill,  there  is  a  Coptic 
church.  Peace  reigns  in  happy  Luxor. 
The  lion  lies  down  with  the  lamb,  and  the 
child,  if  it  will,  may  harmlessly  put  its 
hand  into  the  cockatrice's  den. 

Perhaps  because  it  is  so  surrounded,  so 
haunted  by  life  and  familiar  things,  be- 


LUXOR  99 

cause  the  pigeons  fly  about  it,  the  buffalo 
stares  into  it,  the  goats  stir  up  the  dust 
beside  its  columns,  the  twittering  voices 
of  women  make  a  music  near  its  courts, 
many  people  pay  little  heed  to  this  great 
temple,  gain  but  a  small  impression  from 
it.  It  decorates  the  bank  of  the  Nile. 
You  can  see  it  from  the  dahabiyehs.  For 
many  that  is  enough.  Yet  the  temple  is 
a  noble  one,  and,  for  me,  it  gains  a  defi- 
nite attraction  all  its  own  from  the  busy 
life  about  it,  the  cheerful  hum  and  stir. 
And  if  you  want  fully  to  realize  its  dig- 
nity, you  can  always  visit  it  by  night. 
Then  the  cries  from  the  village  are 
hushed.  The  houses  show  no  lights. 
Only  the  voices  from  the  Nile  steal  up  to 
the  obelisk  of  Rameses,  to  the  pylon  from 
which  the  flags  of  Thebes  once  flew  on 
festal  days,  to  the  shrine  of  Alexander 
the  Great,  with  its  vultures  and  its  stars, 
and  to  the  red  granite  statues  of  Ram- 
eses and  his  wives. 

These  last  are  as  expressive  as  and  of 


ioo  LUXOR 

course  more  definite  than  my  dancers. 
They  are  full  of  character.  They  seem 
to  breathe  out  the  essence  of  a  vanished 
domesticity.  Colossal  are  the  statues  of 
the  king,  solid,  powerful,  and  tremen- 
dous, boldly  facing  the  world  with  the 
calm  of  one  who  was  thought,  and  pos- 
sibly thought  himself,  to  be  not  much 
less  than  a  deity.  And  upon  each  pedes- 
tal, shrinking  delicately  back,  was  once 
a  little  wife.  Some  little  wives  are  left. 
They  are  delicious  in  their  modesty.  Each 
stands  away  from  the  king,  shyly,  respect- 
fully. Each  is  so  small  as  to  be  below  his 
down-stretched  arm.  Each,  with  a  surely 
furtive  gesture,  reaches  out  her  right 
hand,  and  attains  the  swelling  calf  of  her 
noble  husband's  leg.  Plump  are  their  lit- 
tle faces,  but  not  bad-looking.  One  can- 
not pity  the  king.  Nor  does  one  pity 
them.  For  these  were  not  "  Les  desen- 
chantees,"  the  restless,  sad-hearted  wom- 
en of  an  Eastern  world  that  knows  too 
much.  Their  longings  surely  cannot  have 


LUXOR  101 

been  very  great.  Their  world  was  prob- 
ably bounded  by  the  calf  of  Rameses's 
leg.  That  was  "  the  far  horizon  "  of  the 
little  plump-faced  wives. 

The  happy  dancers  and  the  humble 
wives,  they  always  come  before  me  with 
the  temple  of  Luxor — joy  and  discretion 
side  by  side.  And  with  them,  to  my  ears, 
the  two  voices  seem  to  come,  muezzin  and 
angelus  bell,  mingling  not  in  war,  but 
peace.  When  I  think  of  this  temple,  I 
think  of  its  joy  and  peace  far  less  than  of 
its  majesty. 

And  yet  it  is  majestic.  Look  at  it,  as 
I  have  often  done,  toward  sunset  from  the 
western  bank  of  the  Nile,  or  climb  the 
mound  beyond  its  northern  end,  where 
stands  the  grand  entrance,  and  you  real- 
ize at  once  its  nobility  and  solemn  splen- 
dor. From  the  Loulia's  deck  it  was  a  pro- 
cession of  great  columns;  that  was  all. 
But  the  decorative  effect  of  these  columns, 
soaring  above  the  river  and  its  vivid  life, 
is  fine. 


102  LUXOR 

By  day  all  is  turmoil  on  the  river-bank. 
Barges  are  unloading,  steamers  are  ar- 
riving, and  throngs  of  donkey-boys  and 
dragomans  go  down  in  haste  to  meet 
them.  Servants  run  to  and  fro  on  er- 
rands from  the  many  dahabiyehs.  Bath- 
ers leap  into  the  brown  waters.  The  na- 
tive craft  pass  by  with  their  enormous 
sails  outspread  to  catch  the  wind,  bearing 
serried  mobs  of  men,  and  black-robed 
women,  and  laughing,  singing  children. 
The  boatmen  of  the  hotels  sing  monoto- 
nously as  they  lounge  in  the  big,  white 
boats  waiting  for  travellers  to  Medinet- 
Abu,  to  the  Ramesseum,  to  Kurna,  and 
the  tombs.  And  just  above  them  rise  the 
long  lines  of  columns,  ancient,  tranquil, 
and  remote — infinitely  remote,  for  all  their 
nearness,  casting  down  upon  the  sunlit 
gaiety  the  long  shadow  of  the  past. 

From  the  edge  of  the  mound  where 
stands  the  native  village  the  effect  of  the 
temple  is  much  less  decorative,  but  its  de- 
tailed grandeur  can  be  better  grasped 


LUXOR  103 

from  there;  for  from  there  one  sees  the 
great  towers  of  the  propylon,  two  rows  of 
mighty  columns,  the  red  granite  Obelisk 
of  Rameses  the  Great,  and  the  black  gran- 
ite statues  of  the  king.  On  the  right  of 
the  entrance  a  giant  stands,  on  the  left 
one  is  seated,  and  a  little  farther  away  a 
third  emerges  from  the  ground,  which 
reaches  to  its  mighty  breast. 

And  there  the  children  play  perpetually. 
And  there  the  Egyptians  sing  their  sere- 
nades, making  the  pipes  wail  and  strik- 
ing the  derabukkeh ;  and  there  the  women 
gossip  and  twitter  like  the  birds.  And  the 
buffalo  comes  to  take  his  sun-bath;  and 
the  goats  and  the  curly,  brown  sheep  pass 
in  sprightly  and  calm  processions.  The 
obelisk  there,  like  its  brother  in  Paris, 
presides  over  a  cheerfulness  of  life;  but 
it  is  a  life  that  seems  akin  to  it,  not  alien 
from  it.  And  the  king  watches  the  sim- 
plicity of  this  keen  existence  of  Egypt  of 
to-day  far  up  the  Nile  with  a  calm  that 
one  does  not  fear  may  be  broken  by  un- 


104  LUXOR 

sympathetic  outrage,  or  by  any  vision  of 
too  perpetual  foreign  life.  For  the  tour- 
ists each  year  are  but  an  episode  in  Up- 
per Egypt.  Still  the  shadoof-man  sings 
his  ancient  song,  violent  and  pathetic, 
bold  as  the  burning  sun-rays.  Still  the 
fellaheen  plough  with  the  camel  yoked 
with  the  ox.  Still  the  women  are  cov- 
ered with  protective  amulets  and  hold 
their  black  draperies  in  their  mouths. 
The  intimate  life  of  the  Nile  remains  the 
same.  And  that  life  obelisk  and  king 
have  known  for  how  many,  many  years! 
And  so  I  love  to  think  of  this  intimacy 
of  life  about  the  temple  of  the  happy 
dancers  and  the  humble  little  wives,  and 
it  seems  to  me  to  strike  the  keynote  of 
the  golden  coziness  of  Luxor. 


COLOSSI  OF  MEMNON 


IX 

COLOSSI  OF  MEMNON 


sometimes  one  likes  to  es- 
cape from  the  thing  one  loves,  and  there 
are  hours  when  the  gay  voices  of  Luxor 
fatigue  the  ears,  when  one  desires  a  great 
calm.  Then  there  are  silent  voices  that 
summon  one  across  the  river,  when  the 
dawn  is  breaking  over  the  hills  of  the 
Arabian  desert,  or  when  the  sun  is  de- 
clining toward  the  Libyan  mountains  — 
voices  issuing  from  lips  of  stone,  from 
the  twilight  of  sanctuaries,  from  the 
depths  of  rock-hewn  tombs. 

The  peace  of  the  plain  of  Thebes  in  the 
early  morning  is  very  rare  and  very  ex- 
quisite. It  is  not  the  peace  of  the  desert, 
but  rather,  perhaps,  the  peace  of  the 
prairie  —  an  atmosphere  tender,  delicately 
107 


io8         COLOSSI  OF  MEMNON 

thrilling,  softly  bright,  hopeful  in  its 
gleaming  calm.  Often  and  often  have  I 
left  the  Loulia  very  early,  moored  against 
the  long  sand  islet  that  faces  Luxor  when 
the  Nile  has  not  subsided,  I  have  rowed 
across  the  quiet  water  that  divided  me 
from  the  western  bank,  and,  with  a  happy 
heart,  I  have  entered  into  the  lovely  peace 
of  the  great  spaces  that  stretch  from  the 
Colossi  of  Memnon  to  the  Nile,  to  the 
mountains,  southward  toward  Armant, 
northward  to  Kerekten,  to  Danfik,  to 
Gueziret-Meteira.  Think  of  the  color  of 
young  clover,  of  young  barley,  of  young 
wheat;  think  of  the  timbre  of  the  reed 
flute's  voice,  thin,  clear,  and  frail  with 
the  frailty  of  dewdrops ;  think  of  the  tor- 
rents of  spring  rushing  through  the  veins 
of  a  great,  wide  land,  and  growing  al- 
most still  at  last  on  their  journey.  Spring, 
you  will  say,  perhaps,  and  high  Nile  not 
yet  subsided!  But  Egypt  is  the  favored 
land  of  a  spring  that  is  already  alert  at 
the  end  of  November,  and  in  December  is 


COLOSSI  OF  MEMNON          109 

pushing  forth  its  green.  The  Nile  has 
sunk  away  from  the  feet  of  the  Colossi 
that  it  has  bathed  through  many  days.  It 
has  freed  the  plain  to  the  fellaheen, 
though  still  it  keeps  my  island  in  its  clasp. 
And  Hapi,  or  Kam-wra,  the  "  Great  Ex- 
tender," and  Ra,  have  made  this  wonder- 
ful spring  to  bloom  on  the  dark  earth 
before  the  Christian's  Christmas. 

What  a  pastoral  it  is,  this  plain  of 
Thebes,  in  the  dawn  of  day!  Think  of 
the  reed  flute,  I  have  said,  not  because 
you  will  hear  it,  as  you  ride  toward  the 
mountains,  but  because  its  voice  would  be 
utterly  in  place  here,  in  this  arcady  of 
Egypt,  playing  no  tarantella,  but  one  of 
those  songs,  half  bird-like,  and  half 
sadly,  mysteriously  human,  which  come 
from  the  soul  of  the  East.  Instead  of  it, 
you  may  catch  distant  cries  from  the  bank 
of  the  river,  where  the  shadoof-man  toils, 
lifting  ever  the  water  and  his  voice,  the 
one  to  earth,  the  other,  it  seems,  to  sky; 
and  the  creaking  lay  of  the  water-wheel, 


no          COLOSSI   OF  MEMNON 

which  pervades  Upper  Egypt  like  an  at- 
mosphere, and  which,  though  perhaps  at 
first  it  irritates,  at  last  seems  to  you  the 
sound  of  the  soul  of  the  river,  of  the  sun- 
shine, and  the  soil. 

Much  of  the  land  looks  painted.  So 
flat  is  it,  so  young  are  the  growing  crops, 
that  they  are  like  a  coating  of  green  paint 
spread  over  a  mighty  canvas.  But  the 
doura  rises  higher  than  the  heads  of  the 
naked  children  who  stand  among  it  to 
watch  you  canter  past.  And  in  the  far 
distance  you  see  dim  groups  of  trees — 
sycamores  and  acacias,  tamarisks  and 
palms.  Beyond  them  is  the  very  heart  of 
this  "  land  of  sand  and  ruins  and  gold  " : 
Medinet-Abu,  the  Ramesseum,  Deir-el- 
Medinet,  Kurna,  Deir-el-Bahari,  the 
tombs  of  the  kings,  the  tombs  of  the 
queens  and  of  the  princes.  In  the  strip 
of  bare  land  at  the  foot  of  those  hard, 
and  yet  poetic  mountains,  have  been  dug 
up  treasures  the  fame  of  which  has  gone 
to  the  ends  of  the  world.  But  this  plain, 


COLOSSI  OF  MEMNON          in 

where  the  fellaheen  are  stooping  to  the 
soil,  and  the  women  are  carrying  the 
water-jars,  and  the  children  are  playing 
in  the  doura,  and  the  oxen  and  the  camels 
are  working  with  ploughs  that  look  like 
relics  of  far-off  days,  is  the  possession  of 
the  two  great  presiding  beings  whom  you 
see  from  an  enormous  distance,  the 
Colossi  of  Memnon.  Amenhotep  III.  put 
them  where  they  are.  So  we  are  told. 
But  in  this  early  morning  it  is  not  possible 
to  think  of  them  as  being  brought  to  any 
place.  Seated,  the  one  beside  the  other, 
facing  the  Nile  and  the  home  of  the  rising 
sun,  their  immense  aspect  of  patience  sug- 
gests will,  calmly,  steadily  exercised,  sug- 
gests choice ;  that,  for  some  reason,  as  yet 
unknown,  they  chose  to  come  to  this  plain, 
that  they  choose  solemnly  to  remain  there, 
waiting,  while  the  harvests  grow  and  are 
gathered  about  their  feet,  while  the  Nile 
rises  and  subsides,  while  the  years  and  the 
generations  come,  like  the  harvests,  and 
are  stored  away  in  the  granaries  of  the 


112          COLOSSI  OF  MEMNON 

past.  Their  calm  broods  over  this  plain, 
gives  to  it  a  personal  atmosphere  which 
sets  it  quite  apart  from  every  other  flat 
space  of  the  world.  There  is  no  place  that 
I  know  on  the  earth  which  has  the  pecu- 
liar, bright,  ineffable  calm  of  the  plain  of 
these  Colossi.  It  takes  you  into  its  breast, 
and  you  lie  there  in  the  growing  sunshine 
almost  as  if  you  were  a  child  laid  in  the 
lap  of  one  of  them.  That  legend  of  the 
singing  at  dawn  of  the  "  vocal  Memnon," 
how  could  it  have  arisen?  How  could 
such  calmness  sing,  such  patience  ever  find 
a  voice?  Unlike  the  Sphinx,  which  be- 
comes ever  more  impressive  as  you  draw 
near  to  it,  and  is  most  impressive  when 
you  sit  almost  at  its  feet,  the  Colossi  lose 
in  personality  as  you  approach  them  and 
can  see  how  they  have  been  defaced. 

From  afar  one  feels  their  minds,  their 
strange,  unearthly  temperaments  com- 
manding this  pastoral.  When  you  are  be- 
side them,  this  feeling  disappears.  Their 
features  are  gone,  and  though  in  their 


COLOSSI  OF  MEMNON          113 

attitudes  there  is  power,  and  there  is 
something  that  awakens  awe,  they  are 
more  wonderful  as  a  far-off  feature  of 
the  plain.  They  .gain  in  grandeur  from 
the  night,  in  strangeness  from  the  moon- 
rise,  perhaps  specially  when  the  Nile  comes 
to  their  feet.  More  than  three  thousand 
years  old,  they  look  less  eternal  than  the 
Sphinx.  Like  them,  the  Sphinx  is  wait- 
ing, but  with  a  greater  purpose.  The 
Sphinx  reduces  man  really  to  nothing- 
ness. The  Colossi  leave  him  some  rem- 
nants of  individuality.  One  can  conceive 
of  Strabo  and  ^lius  Gallus,  of  Hadrian 
and  Sabina,  of  others  who  came  over  the 
sunlit  land  to  hear  the  unearthly  song  in 
the  dawn,  being  of  some — not  much,  but 
still  of  some — importance  here.  Before 
the  Sphinx  no  one  is  important.  But  in 
the  distance  of  the  plain  the  Colossi  shed 
a  real  magic  of  calm  and  solemn  person- 
ality, and  subtly  seem  to  mingle  their 
spirit  with  the  flat,  green  world,  so  wide, 
so  still,  so  fecund,  and  so  peaceful;  with 


114         COLOSSI  OF  MEMNON 

the  soft  airs  that  are  surely  scented  with 
an  eternal  springtime,  and  with  the  light 
that  the  morning  rains  down  on  wheat 
and  clover,  on  Indian  corn  and  barley,  and 
on  brown  men  laboring,  who,  perhaps, 
from  the  patience  of  the  Colossi  in  repose 
have  drawn  a  patience  in  labor  that  has 
in  it  something  not  less  sublime. 

From  the  Colossi  one  goes  onward  to- 
ward the  trees  and  the  mountains,  and 
very  soon  one  comes  to  the  edge  of  that 
strange  and  fascinating  strip  of  barren 
land  which  is  strewn  with  temples  and 
honeycombed  with  tombs.  The  sun  burns 
down  on  it.  The  heat  seems  thrown  back 
upon  it  by  the  wall  of  tawny  mountains 
that  bounds  it  on  the  west.  It  is  dusty,  it 
is  arid;  it  is  haunted  by  swarms  of  flies, 
by  the  guardians  of  the  ruins,  and  by  men 
and  boys  trying  to  sell  enormous  scarabs 
and  necklaces  and  amulets,  made  yester- 
day, and  the  day  before,  in  the  manufac- 
tory of  Kurna.  From  many  points  it 
looks  not  unlike  a  strangely  prolonged 


COLOSSI  OF  MEMNON          115 

rubbish-heap  in  which  busy  giants  have 
been  digging  with  huge  spades,  making 
mounds  and  pits,  caverns  and  trenches, 
piling  up  here  a  monstrous  heap  of  stones, 
casting  down  there  a  mighty  statue.  But 
how  it  fascinates!  Of  course  one  knows 
what  it  means.  One  knows  that  on  this 
strip  of  land  Naville  dug  out  at  Deir-el- 
Bahari  the  temple  of  Mentu-hotep,  and 
discovered  later,  in  her  shrine,  Hathor, 
the  cow-goddess,  with  the  lotus-plants 
streaming  from  her  sacred  forehead  to 
her  feet;  that  long  before  him  Mariette 
here  brought  to  the  light  at  Drah-abu'l- 
Neggah  the  treasures  of  kings  of  the 
twelfth  and  thirteenth  dynasties;  that  at 
the  foot  of  those  tiger-colored  precipices 
Theodore  M.  Davis  the  American  found 
the  sepulchre  of  Queen  Hatshepsu,  the 
Queen  Elizabeth  of  the  old  Egyptian 
world,  and,  later,  the  tomb  of  Yuaa  and 
Thuaa,  the  parents  of  Queen  Thiy,  con- 
taining mummy-cases  covered  with  gold, 
jars  of  oil  and  wine,  gold,  silver,  and  ala- 


n6         COLOSSI  OF  MEMNON 

baster  boxes,  a  bed  decorated  with  gilded 
ivory,  a  chair  with  gilded  plaster  reliefs, 
chairs  of  state,  and  a  chariot;  that  here 
Maspero,  Victor  Loret,  Brugsch  Bey,  and 
other  patient  workers  gave  to  the  world 
tombs  that  had  been  hidden  and  unknown 
for  centuries;  that  there  to  the  north  is 
the  temple  of  Kurna,  and  over  there 
the  Ramesseum;  that  those  rows  of  little 
pillars  close  under  the  mountain,  and  look- 
ing strangely  modern,  are  the  pillars  of 
Hatshepsu's  temple,  which  bears  upon  its 
walls  the  pictures  of  the  expedition  to  the 
historic  land  of  Punt ;  that  the  kings  were 
buried  there,  and  there  the  queens  and 
the  princes  of  the  vanished  dynasties; 
that  beyond  to  the  west  is  the  temple  of 
Deir-el-Medinet  with  its  judgment  of  the 
dead;  that  here  by  the  native  village  is 
Medinet-Abu.  One  knows  that,  and  so 
the  imagination  is  awake,  ready  to  paint 
the  lily  and  to  gild  the  beaten  gold.  But 
even  if  one  did  not  know,  I  think  one 
would  be  fascinated.  This  turmoil  of  sun- 


COLOSSI  OF  MEMNON         117 

baked  earth  and  rock,  grey,  yellow,  pink, 
orange,  and  red,  awakens  the  curiosity, 
summons  the  love  of  the  strange,  sug- 
gests that  it  holds  secrets  to  charm  the 
souls  of  men. 


MEDINET-ABU 


X 

MEDINET-ABU 

AT  the  entrance  to  the  temple  of  Medinet- 
Abu,  near  the  small  groups  of  palms  and 
the  few  brown  houses,  often  have  I  turned 
and  looked  back  across  the  plain  before 
entering  through  the  first  beautiful  door- 
way, to  see  the  patient  backs  and  right 
sides  of  the  Colossi,  the  far-off,  dreamy 
mountains  beyond  Karnak  and  the  Nile. 
And  again,  when  I  have  entered  and 
walked  a  little  distance,  I  have  looked  back 
at  the  almost  magical  picture  framed  in 
the  doorway;  at  the  bottom  of  the  pic- 
ture a  layer  of  brown  earth,  then  a  strip 
of  sharp  green — the  cultivated  ground — 
then  a  blur  of  pale  yellow,  then  a  dark- 
ness of  trees,  and  just  the  hint  of  a  hill 
far,  very  far  away.  And  always,  in  look- 
121 


122  MEDINET-ABU 

ing,  I  have  thought  of  the  "  Sposalizio  " 
of  Raphael  in  the  Brera  at  Milan,  of  the 
tiny  dream  of  blue  country  framed  by  his 
temple  doorway  beyond  the  Virgin  and 
Saint  Joseph.  The  doorways  of  the  tem- 
ples of  Egypt  are  very  noble,  and  no- 
where have  I  been  more  struck  by  their 
nobility  than  in  Medinet-Abu.  Set  in  huge 
walls  of  massive  masonry,  which  rise 
slightly  above  them  on  each  side,  with  a 
projecting  cornice,  in  their  simplicity  they 
look  extraordinarily  classical,  in  their 
sobriety  mysterious,  and  in  their  great 
solidity  quite  wonderfully  elegant.  And 
they  always  suggest  to  me  that  they  are 
giving  access  to  courts  and  chambers 
which  still,  even  in  our  times,  are  dedi- 
cated to  secret  cults — to  the  cults  of  Isis, 
of  Hathor,  and  of  Osiris. 

Close  to  the  right  of  the  front  of  Medi- 
net-Abu there  are  trees  covered  with  yel- 
low flowers;  beyond  are  fields  of  doura. 
Behind  the  temple  is  a  sterility  which 
makes  one  think  of  metal.  A  great  calm 


MEDINET-ABU  123 

enfolds  this  place.  The  buildings  are  of 
the  same  color  as  the  Colossi.  When  I 
speak  of  the  buildings,  I  include  the  great 
temple,  the  pavilion  of  Rameses  III.,  and 
the  little  temple,  which  together  may  be 
said  to  form  Medinet-Abu.  Whereas  the 
temple  of  Luxor  seems  to  open  its  arms 
to  life,  and  the  great  fascination  of  the 
Ramesseum  comes  partly  from  its  inva- 
sion by  every  travelling  air  and  happy 
sun-ray,  its  openness  and  freedom,  Medi- 
net-Abu impresses  by  its  colossal  air  of 
secrecy,  by  its  fortress-like  seclusion.  Its 
walls  are  immensely  thick,  and  are  cov- 
ered with  figures  the  same  color  as  the 
walls,  some  of  them  very  tall.  Thick-set, 
massive,  heavy,  almost  warlike  it  is.  Two 
seated  statues  within,  statues  with  ani- 
mals' faces,  steel-colored,  or  perhaps  a 
little  darker  than  that,  look  like  savage 
warders  ready  to  repel  intrusion. 

Passing  between  them,  delicately  as 
Agag,  one  enters  an  open  space  with 
ruins,  upon  the  right  of  which  is  a  low, 


124  MEDINET-ABU 

small  temple,  grey  in  hue,  and  covered 
with  inscriptions,  which  looks  almost 
bowed  under  its  tremendous  weight  of 
years.  From  this  dignified,  though  tiny, 
veteran  there  comes  a  perpetual  sound  of 
birds.  The  birds  in  Egypt  have  no  rever- 
ence for  age.  Never  have  I  seen  them 
more  restless,  more  gay,  or  more  imperti- 
nent, than  in  the  immemorial  ruins  of  this 
ancient  land.  Beyond  is  an  enormous  por- 
tal, on  the  lofty  ceiling  of  which  still  lin- 
ger traces  of  faded  red  and  blue,  which 
gives  access  to  a  great  hall  with  rows  of 
mighty  columns,  those  on  the  left  hand 
round,  those  on  the  right  square,  and  al- 
most terribly  massive.  There  is  in  these 
no  grace,  as  in  the  giant  lotus  columns  of 
Karnak.  Prodigious,  heavy,  barbaric, 
they  are  like  a  hymn  in  stone  to  Strength. 
There  is  something  brutal  in  their  aspect, 
which  again  makes  one  think  of  war,  of 
assaults  repelled,  hordes  beaten  back  like 
waves  by  a  sea-wall.  And  still  another 
great  hall,  with  more  gigantic  columns, 


MEDINET-ABU  125 

lies  in  the  sun  beyond,  and  a  doorway 
through  which  seems  to  stare  fiercely  the 
edge  of  a  hard  and  fiery  mountain.  Al- 
though one  is  roofed  by  the  sky,  there  is 
something  oppressive  here ;  an  imprisoned 
feeling  comes  over  one.  I  could  never  be 
fond  of  Medinet-Abu,  as  I  am  fond  of 
Luxor,  of  parts  of  Karnak,  of  the  whole 
of  delicious,  poetical  Philae.  The  big  py- 
lons, with  their  great  walls  sloping  in- 
ward, sand-colored,  and  glowing  with  very 
pale  yellow  in  the  sun,  the  resistant  walls, 
the  brutal  columns,  the  huge  and  almost 
savage  scale  of  everything,  always  remind 
me  of  the  violence  in  men,  and  also — I 
scarcely  know  why — make  me  think  of 
the  North,  of  sullen  Northern  castles  by 
the  sea,  in  places  where  skies  are  grey, 
and  the  white  of  foam  and  snow  is  mar- 
ried in  angry  nights. 

And  yet  in  Medinet-Abu  there  reigns  a 
splendid  calm — a  calm  that  sometimes 
seems  massive,  resistant,  as  the  columns 
and  the  walls.  Peace  is  certainly  inclosed 


126  MEDINET-ABU 

by  the  stones  that  call  up  thoughts  of  war, 
as  if,  perhaps,  their  purpose  had  been 
achieved  many  centuries  ago,  and  they 
were  quit  of  enemies  for  ever.  Rameses 
III.  is  connected  with  Medinet-Abu.  He 
was  one  of  the  greatest  of  the  Egyptian 
kings,  and  has  been  called  the  "  last  of 
the  great  sovereigns  of  Egypt."  He  ruled 
for  thirty-one  years,  and  when,  after  a 
first  visit  to  Medinet-Abu,  I  looked  into 
his  records,  I  was  interested  to  find  that 
his  conquests  and  his  wars  had  "  a  char- 
acter essentially  defensive."  This  defen- 
sive spirit  is  incarnated  in  the  stones  of 
these  ruins.  One  reads  in  them  some- 
thing of  the  soul  of  this  king  who  lived 
twelve  hundred  years  before  Christ,  and 
who  desired,  "  in  remembrance  of  his 
Syrian  victories,"  to  give  to  his  memorial 
temple  an  outward  military  aspect.  I  no- 
ticed a  military  aspect  at  once  inside  this 
temple;  but  if  you  circle  the  buildings 
outside  it  is  more  unmistakable.  For  the 
east  front  has  a  battlemented  wall,  and 


MEDINET-ABU  127 

the  battlements  are  shield-shaped.  This 
fortress,  or  migdol,  a  name  which  the  an- 
cient Egyptians  borrowed  from  the  no- 
madic tribes  of  Syria,  is  called  the  "  Pa- 
vilion of  Rameses  III.,"  and  his  principal 
battles  are  represented  upon  its  walls. 
The  monarch  does  not  hesitate  to  speak 
of  himself  in  terms  of  praise,  suggesting 
that  he  was  like  the  God  Mentu,  who  was 
the  Egyptian  war  god,  and  whose  cult 
at  Thebes  was  at  one  period  more  import- 
ant even  than  was  the  cult  of  Amun,  and 
also  plainly  hinting  that  he  was  a  brave 
fellow.  "  I,  Rameses  the  King,"  he  mur- 
murs, "  behaved  as  a  hero  who  knows  his 
worth."  If  hieroglyphs  are  to  be  trusted, 
various  Egyptian  kings  of  ancient  times 
seem  to  have  had  some  vague  suspicion 
of  their  own  value,  and  the  walls  of  Medi- 
net-Abu  are,  to  speak  sincerely,  one 
mighty  boast.  In  his  later  years  the  king 
lived  in  peace  and  luxury,  surrounded  by 
a  vicious  and  intriguing  Court,  haunted 
by  magicians,  hags,  and  mystery-mon- 


128  MEDINET-ABU 

gers.  Dealers  in  magic  may  still  be 
found  on  the  other  side  of  the  river,  in 
happy  Luxor.  I  made  the  acquaintance  of 
two  when  I  was  there,  one  of  whom  of- 
fered for  a  couple  of  pounds  to  provide 
me  with  a  preservative  against  all  such 
dangers  as  beset  the  traveller  in  wild 
places.  In  order  to  prove  its  efficacy  he 
asked  me  to  come  to  his  house  by  night, 
bringing  a  dog  and  my  revolver  with  me. 
He  would  hang  the  charm  about  the  dog's 
neck,  and  I  was  then  to  put  six  shots  into 
the  animal's  body.  He  positively  assured 
me  that  the  dog  would  be  uninjured.  I 
half-promised  to  come,  and,  when  night 
began  to  fall,  looked  vaguely  about  for 
a  dog.  At  last  I  found  one,  but  it  howled 
so  dismally  when  I  asked  Ibrahim  Ayyad 
to  take  possession  of  it  for  experimental 
purposes,  that  I  weakly  gave  up  the 
project,  and  left  the  magician  clamor- 
ing for  his  hundred  and  ninety-five 
piastres. 

Its  warlike  aspect  gives  a  special  per- 


MEDINET-ABU  129 

sonality  to  Medinet-Abu.  The  shield- 
shaped  battlements;  the  courtyards,  with 
their  brutal  columns,  narrowing  as  they 
recede  toward  the  mountains;  the  heavy 
gateways,  with  superimposed  chambers; 
the  towers;  quadrangular  bastion  to  pro- 
tect, inclined  basement  to  resist  the  at- 
tacks of  sappers  and  cause  projectiles  to 
rebound — all  these  things  contribute  to 
this  very  definite  effect. 

I  have  heard  travellers  on  the  Nile 
speak  piteously  of  the  confusion  wakened 
in  their  minds  by  a  hurried  survey  of 
many  temples,  statues,  monuments,  and 
tombs.  But  if  one  stays  long  enough  this 
confusion  fades  happily  away,  and  one 
differentiates  between  the  antique  person- 
alities of  Ancient  Egypt  almost  as  easily 
as  one  differentiates  between  the  person- 
alities of  one's  familiar  friends.  Among 
these  personalities  Medinet-Abu  is  the 
warrior,  standing  like  Mentu,  with  the 
solar  disk,  and  the  two  plumes  erect 
above  his  head  of  a  hawk,  firmly  planted 


130  MEDINET-ABU 

at  the  foot  of  the  Theban  mountains, 
ready  to  repel  all  enemies,  to  beat  back 
all  assaults,  strong  and  determined, 
powerful  and  brutally  serene. 


THE  RAMESSEUM 


XI 
THE   RAMESSEUM 

"  THIS,  my  lord,  is  the  thinking-place  of 
Rameses  the  Great." 

So  said  Ibrahim  Ayyad  to  me  one 
morning — Ibrahim,  who  is  almost  as  pro- 
lific in  the  abrupt  creation  of  peers  as  if 
he  were  a  democratic  government. 

I  looked  about  me.  We  stood  in  a 
ruined  hall  with  columns,  architraves  cov- 
ered with  inscriptions,  segments  of  flat 
roof.  Here  and  there  traces  of  painting, 
dull-red,  pale,  ethereal  blue — the  "  love- 
color  "  of  Egypt,  as  the  Egyptians  often 
call  it — still  adhered  to  the  stone.  This 
hall,  dignified,  grand,  but  happy,  was 
open  on  all  sides  to  the  sun  and  air.  From 
it  I  could  see  tamarisk-  and  acacia-trees, 
and  far-off  shadowy  mountains  beyond 
the  eastern  verge  of  the  Nile.  And  the 
133 


134  THE    RAMESSEUM 

trees  were  still  as  carven  things  in  an  at- 
mosphere that  was  a  miracle  of  clearness 
and  of  purity.  Behind  me,  and  near,  the 
hard  Libyan  mountains  gleamed  in  the 
sun.  Somewhere  a  boy  was  singing;  and 
suddenly  his  singing  died  away.  And  I 
thought  of  the  "Lay  of  the  Harper" 
which  is  inscribed  upon  the  tombs  of 
Thebes — those  tombs  under  those  gleam- 
ing mountains: 

"  For  no  one  carries  away  his  goods  with  him ; 
Yea,  no  one  returns  again  who  has  gone  thither." 

It  took  the  place  of  the  song  that  had 
died  as  I  thought  of  the  great  king's 
glory;  that  he  had  been  here,  and  had 
long  since  passed  away. 

"  The  thinking-place  of  Rameses  the 
Great!" 

"  Suttinly." 

"  You  must  leave  me  alone  here,  Ibra- 
him." 

I  watched  his  gold-colored  robe  vanish 
into  the  gold  of  the  sun  through  the  cop- 
per color  of  the  columns.  And  I  was  quite 


THE    RAMESSEUM  135 

alone  in  the  "  thinking-place  "  of  Ram- 
eses.  It  was  a  brilliant  day,  the  sky  dark 
sapphire  blue,  without  even  the  spectre  of 
a  cloud,  or  any  airy,  vaporous  veil;  the 
heat  already  intense  in  the  full  sunshine, 
but  delicious  if  one  slid  into  a  shadow.  I 
slid  into  a  shadow,  and  sat  down  on  a 
warm  block  of  stone.  And  the  silence 
flowed  upon  me — the  silence  of  the  Ram- 
esseum. 

Was  Horbehutet,  the  winged  disk,  with 
crowned  ur&i,  ever  set  up  above  this  tem- 
ple's principal  door  to  keep  it  from  de- 
struction? I  do  not  know.  But,  if  he 
was,  he  failed  perfectly  to  fulfil  his  mis- 
sion. And  I  am  glad  he  failed.  I  am 
glad  of  the  ruin  that  is  here,  glad  that 
walls  have  crumbled  or  been  overthrown, 
that  columns  have  been  cast  down,  and 
ceilings  torn  off  from  the  pillars  that  sup- 
ported them,  letting  in  the  sky.  I  would 
have  nothing  different  in  the  thinking- 
place  of  Rameses. 

Like  a  cloud,  a  great  golden  cloud,  a 


136  THE    RAMESSEUM 

glory  impending  that  will  not,  cannot,  be 
dissolved  into  the  ether,  he  loomed  over 
the  Egypt  that  is  dead,  he  looms  over  the 
Egypt  of  to-day.  Everywhere  you  meet 
his  traces,  everywhere  you  hear  his  name. 
You  say  to  a  tall  young  Egyptian :  "  How 
big  you  are  growing,  Hassan ! " 

He  answers,  "  Come  back  next  year, 
my  gentleman,  and  I  shall  be  like  Ram- 
eses  the  Great." 

Or  you  ask  of  the  boatman  who  rows 
you,  "  How  can  you  pull  all  day  against 
the  current  of  the  Nile?  "  And  he  smiles, 
and  lifting  his  brown  arm,  he  says  to 
you :  "  Look !  I  am  strong  as  Rameses 
the  Great." 

This  familiar  fame  comes  down  through 
some  three  thousand,  two  hundred  and 
twenty  years.  Carved  upon  limestone  and 
granite,  now  it  seems  engraven  also  on 
every  Egyptian  heart  that  beats  not  only 
with  the  movement  of  shadoof,  or  is  not 
buried  in  the  black  soil  fertilized  by  Hapi. 
Thus  can  inordinate  vanity  prolong  the 


THE    RAMESSEUM  137 

true  triumph  of  genius,  and  impress  its 
own  view  of  itself  upon  the  minds  of  mil- 
lions. This  Rameses  is  believed  to  be  the 
Pharaoh  who  oppressed  the  children  of 
Israel. 

As  I  sat  in  the  Ramesseum  that  morn- 
ing, I  recalled  his  face — the  face  of  an 
artist  and  a  dreamer  rather  than  that  of 
a  warrior  and  oppressor;  Asiatic,  hand- 
some, not  insensitive,  not  cruel,  but  subtle, 
aristocratic,  and  refined.  I  could  imagine 
it  bending  above  the  little  serpents  of  the 
sistrum  as  they  lifted  their  melodious 
voices  to  bid  Typhon  depart,  or  watching 
the  dancing  women's  rhythmic  move- 
ments, or  smiling  half  kindly,  half  with 
irony,  upon  the  lovelorn  maiden  who  made 
her  plaint: 

"  What  is  sweet  to  the  mouth,  to  me  is  as  the 

gall  of  birds ; 
Thy  breath  alone  can  comfort  my  heart." 

And  I  could  imagine  it  looking  pro- 
foundly grave,  not  sad,  among  the  col- 
umns with  their  opening  lotus  flowers. 


138  THE    RAMESSEUM 

For  it  is  the  hall  of  lotus  columns  that 
Ibrahim  calls  the  thinking-place  of  the 
king. 

There  is  something  both  lovely  and 
touching  to  me  in  the  lotus  columns  of 
Egypt,  in  the  tall  masses  of  stone  opening 
out  into  flowers  near  the  sun.  Near  the 
sun!  Yes;  only  that  obvious  falsehood 
will  convey  to  those  who  have  not  seen 
them  the  effect  of  some  of  the  hypostyle 
halls,  the  columns  of  which  seem  literally 
soaring  to  the  sky.  And  flowers  of  stone, 
you  will  say,  rudely  carved  and  rugged! 
That  does  not  matter.  There  was  poetry 
in  the  minds  that  conceived  them,  in  the 
thought  that  directed  the  hands  which 
shaped  them  and  placed  them  where  they 
are.  In  Egypt  perpetually  one  feels  how 
the  ancient  Egyptians  loved  the  Nymphaa 
lotus,  which  is  the  white  lotus,  and  the 
Nymphcea  cceruloea,  the  lotus  that  is  blue. 
Did  they  not  place  Horus  in  its  cup,  and 
upon  the  head  of  Nefer-Tum,  the  nature 
god,  who  represented  in  their  mythology 


THE    RAMESSEUM  139 

the  heat  of  the  rising  sun,  and  who  seems 
to  have  been  credited  with  power  to  grant 
life  in  the  world  to  come,  set  it  as  a  sort 
of  regal  ornament?  To  Seti  I.,  when  he 
returned  in  glory  from  his  triumphs  over 
the  Syrians,  were  given  bouquets  of  lotus- 
blossoms  by  the  great  officers  of  his  house- 
hold. The  tiny  column  of  green  feldspar 
ending  in  the  lotus  typified  eternal  youth, 
even  as  the  carnelian  buckle  typified  the 
blood  of  Isis,  which  washed  away  all  sin. 
Kohl  pots  were  fashioned  in  the  form  of 
the  lotus,  cartouches  sprang  from  it,  wine 
flowed  from  cups  shaped  like  it.  The 
lotus  was  part  of  the  very  life  of  Egypt, 
as  the  rose,  the  American  Beauty  rose,  is 
part  of  our  social  life  of  to-day.  And 
here,  in  the  Ramesseum,  I  found  campani- 
form,  or  lotus-flower  capitals  on  the  col- 
umns— here  where  Rameses  once  perhaps 
dreamed  of  his  Syrian  campaigns,  or  of 
that  famous  combat  when,  "  like  Baal  in 
his  fury,"  he  fought  single-handed  against 
the  host  of  the  Hittites  massed  in  two 


140  THE    RAMESSEUM 

thousand,  five  hundred  chariots  to  over- 
throw him. 

The  Ramesseum  is  a  temple  not  of 
winds,  but  of  soft  and  kindly  airs.  There 
comes  Zephyrus,  whispering  love  to  Flora 
incarnate  in  the  Lotus.  To  every  sun- 
beam, to  every  little  breeze,  the  ruins 
stretch  out  arms.  They  adore  the  deep- 
blue  sky,  the  shining,  sifted  sand,  untram- 
melled nature,  all  that  whispers,  "  Free- 
dom." 

So  I  felt  that  day  when  Ibrahim  left 
me,  so  I  feel  always  when  I  sit  in  the 
Ramesseum,  that  exultant  victim  of 
Time's  here  not  sacrilegious  hand. 

All  strong  souls  cry  out  secretly  for 
liberty  as  for  a  sacred  necessity  of  life. 
Liberty  seems  to  drench  the  Ramesseum. 
And  all  strong  souls  must  exult  there. 
The  sun  has  taken  it  as  a  beloved  posses- 
sion. No  massy  walls  keep  him  out.  No 
shield-shaped  battlements  rear  themselves 
up  against  the  outer  world  as  at  Medinet- 
Abu.  No  huge  pylons  cast  down  upon 


THE    RAMESSEUM  141 

the  ground  their  forms  in  darkness.  The 
stone  glows  with  the  sun,  seems  almost  to 
have  a  soul  glowing  with  the  sense,  the 
sun-ray  sense,  of  freedom.  The  heart 
leaps  up  in  the  Ramesseum,  not  frivol- 
ously, but  with  a  strange,  sudden  knowl- 
edge of  the  depths  of  passionate  joy  there 
are  in  life  and  in  bountiful,  glorious  na- 
ture. Instead  of  the  strength  of  a  prison, 
one  feels  the  ecstasy  of  space;  instead  of 
the  safety  of  inclosure,  the  rapture  of 
naked  publicity.  But  the  public  to  whom 
this  place  of  the  great  king  is  consigned 
is  a  public  of  Theban  hills;  of  the  sun- 
beams striking  from  them  over  the  wide 
world  toward  the  east;  of  light  airs,  of 
drifting  sand  grains,  of  singing  birds, 
and  of  butterflies  with  pure  white  wings. 
If  you  have  ever  ridden  an  Arab  horse, 
mounted  in  the  heart  of  an  oasis,  to  the 
verge  of  the  great  desert,  you  will  remem- 
ber the  bound,  thrilling  with  fiery  anima- 
tion, which  he  gives  when  he  sets  his  feet 
on  the  sand  beyond  the  last  tall  date- 


142  THE    RAMESSEUM 

palms.  A  bound  like  that  the  soul  gives 
when  you  sit  in  the  Ramesseum,  and  see 
the  crowding  sunbeams,  the  far-off  groves 
of  palm-trees,  and  the  drowsy  mountains, 
like  shadows,  that  sleep  beyond  the  Nile. 
And  you  look  up,  perhaps,  as  I  looked  that 
morning,  and  upon  a  lotus  column  near 
you,  relieved,  you  perceive  the  figure  of  a 
young  man  singing. 

A  young  man  singing !  Let  him  be  the 
tutelary  god  of  this  place,  whoever  he  be, 
whether  only  some  humble,  happy  slave, 
or  the  "  superintendent  of  song  and  of  the 
recreation  of  the  king."  Rather  even  than 
Amun-Ra  let  him  be  the  god.  For  there 
is  something  nobly  joyous  in  this  archi- 
tecture, a  dignity  that  sings. 

It  has  been  said,  but  not  established, 
that  Rameses  the  Great  was  buried  in  the 
Ramesseum,  and  when  first  I  entered  it 
the  "  Lay  of  the  Harper  "  came  to  my 
mind,  with  the  sadness  that  attends  the 
passing  away  of  glory  into  the  shades  of 
death.  But  an  optimism  almost  as  de- 


THE    RAMESSEUM  143 

termined  as  Emerson's  was  quickly  bred 
in  me  there.  I  could  not  be  sad,  though 
I  could  be  happily  thoughtful,  in  the  light 
of  the  Ramesseum.  And  even  when  I  left 
the  thinking-place,  and,  coming  down  the 
central  aisle,  saw  in  the  immersing  sun- 
shine of  the  Osiride  Court  the  fallen  col- 
ossus of  the  king,  I  was  not  struck  to  sad- 
ness. 

Imagine  the  greatest  figure  in  the 
world — such  a  figure  as  this  Rameses  was 
in  his  day — with  all  might,  all  glory,  all 
climbing  power,  all  vigor,  tenacity  of  pur- 
pose, and  granite  strength  of  will  con- 
centrated within  it,  struck  suddenly  down, 
and  falling  backward  in  a  collapse  of 
which  the  thunder  might  shake  the  vitals 
of  the  earth,  and  you  have  this  prostrate 
colossus.  Even  now  one  seems  to  hear 
it  fall,  to  feel  the  warm  soil  trembling  be- 
neath one's  feet  as  one  approaches  it.  A 
row  of  statues  of  enormous  size,  with 
arms  crossed  as  if  in  resignation,  glowing 
in  the  sun,  in  color  not  gold  or  amber, 


144  THE    RAMESSEUM 

but  a  delicate,  desert  yellow,  watch  near 
it  like  servants  of  the  dead.  On  a  slightly 
lower  level  than  there  it  lies,  and  a  little 
nearer  the  Nile.  Only  the  upper  half  of 
the  figure  is  left,  but  its  size  is  really  ter- 
rific. This  colossus  was  fifty-seven  feet 
high.  It  weighed  eight  hundred  tons. 
Eight  hundred  tons  of  syenite  went  to 
its  making,  and  across  the  shoulders  its 
breadth  is,  or  was,  over  twenty-two  feet. 
But  one  does  not  think  of  measurements 
as  one  looks  upon  it.  It  is  stupendous. 
That  is  obvious  and  that  is  enough.  Nor 
does  one  think  of  its  finish,  of  its  beauti- 
ful, rich  colour,  of  any  of  its  details.  One 
thinks  of  it  as  a  tremendous  personage 
laid  low,  as  the  mightiest  of  the  mighty 
fallen.  One  thinks  of  it  as  the  dead  Ram- 
eses  whose  glory  still  looms  over  Egypt 
like  a  golden  cloud  that  will  not  disperse. 
One  thinks  of  it  as  the  soul  that  com- 
manded, and,  lo!  there  rose  up  above  the 
sands,  at  the  foot  of  the  hills  of  Thebes, 
the  exultant  Ramesseum. 


DEIR-EL-BAHARI 


XII 
DEIR-EL-BAHARI 

PLACE;  for  Queen  Hatshepsu!  Surely 
she  comes  to  a  sound  of  flutes,  a  merry 
noise  of  thin,  bright  music,  backed  by  a 
clashing  of  barbaric  cymbals,  along  the 
corridors  of  the  past;  this  queen  who  is 
shown  upon  Egyptian  walls  dressed  as  a 
man,  who  is  said  to  have  worn  a  beard, 
and  who  sent  to  the  land  of  Punt  the 
famous  expedition  which  covered  her  with 
glory  and  brought  gold  to  the  god  Amun. 
To  me  most  feminine  she  seemed  when  I 
saw  her  temple  at  Deir-el-Bahari,  with 
its  brightness  and  its  suavity;  its  pretty 
shallowness  and  sunshine;  its  white,  and 
blue,  and  yellow,  and  red,  and  green  and 
orange ;  all  very  trim  and  fanciful,  all  very 
smart  and  delicate;  full  of  finesse  and 
laughter,  and  breathing  out  to  me  of  the 
147 


148  DEIR-EL-BAHARI 

twentieth  century  the  coquetry  of  a  wom- 
an in  1500  B.  C.  After  the  terrific  mas- 
culinity of  Medinet-Abu,  after  the  great 
freedom  of  the  Ramesseum,  and  the 
grandeur  of  its  colossus,  the  manhood  of 
all  the  ages  concentrated  in  granite,  the 
temple  at  Deir-el-Bahari  came  upon  me 
like  a  delicate  woman,  perfumed  and  ar- 
ranged, clothed  in  a  creation  of  white  and 
blue  and  orange,  standing — ever  so  know- 
ingly— against  a  background  of  orange 
and  pink,  of  red  and  of  brown-red,  a  smil- 
ing coquette  of  the  mountain,  a  gay  and 
sweet  enchantress  who  knew  her  pretty 
powers  and  meant  to  exercise  them. 

Hatshepsu  with  a  beard!  Never  will 
I  believe  it.  Or  if  she  ever  seemed  to 
wear  one,  I  will  swear  it  was  only  the  tat- 
tooed ornament  with  which  all  the  lovely 
women  of  the  Fayum  decorate  their  chins 
to-day,  throwing  into  relief  the  smiling, 
soft  lips,  the  delicate  noses,  the  liquid  eyes, 
and  leading  one  from  it  step  by  step  to 
the  beauties  it  precedes. 


DEIR-EL-BAHARI  149 

Mr.  Wall  is  Budge  says  in  his  book  on 
the  antiquities  of  Egypt :  "  It  would  be 
unjust  to  the  memory  of  a  great  man  and 
a  loyal  servant  of  Hatshepsu,  if  we  omit- 
ted to  mention  the  name  of  Senmut,  the 
architect  and  overseer  of  works  at  Deir- 
el-Bahari."  By  all  means  let  Senmut  be 
mentioned,  and  then  let  him  be  utterly  for- 
gotten. A  radiant  queen  reigns  here — a 
queen  of  fantasy  and  splendor,  and  of  that 
divine  shallowness — refined  frivolity  lit- 
erally cut  into  the  mountain — which  is  the 
note  of  Deir-el-Bahari.  And  what  a 
clever  background !  Oh,  Hatshepsu  knew 
what  she  was  doing  when  she  built  her 
temple  here.  It  was  not  the  solemn  Sen- 
mut (he  wore  a  beard,  I'm  sure)  who 
chose  that  background,  if  I  know  any- 
thing of  women. 

Long  before  I  visited  Deir-el-Bahari 
I  had  looked  at  it  from  afar.  My  eyes 
had  been  drawn  to  it  merely  from  its  sit- 
uation right  underneath  the  mountains.  I 
had  asked :  "  What  do  those  little  pillars 


1 50  DEIR-EL-B  AH  ARI 

mean?  And  are  those  little  doors?"  I 
had  promised  myself  to  go  there,  as  one 
promises  oneself  a  bonne  bouche  to  finish 
a  happy  banquet.  And  I  had  realized  the 
subtlety,  essentially  feminine,  that  had 
placed  a  temple  there.  And  Menu-Ho- 
tep's  temple,  perhaps  you  say,  was  it  not 
there  before  the  queen's?  Then  he  must 
have  possessed  a  subtlety  purely  femi- 
nine, or  have  been  advised  by  one  of  his 
wives  in  his  building  operations,  or  by 
some  favorite  female  slave.  Blundering, 
unsubtle  man  would  probably  think  that 
the  best  way  to  attract  and  to  fix  atten- 
tion on  any  object  was  to  make  it  much 
bigger  than  things  near  and  around  it, 
to  set  up  a  giant  among  dwarfs. 

Not  so  Queen  Hatshepsu.  More  art- 
ful in  her  generation,  she  set  her  long  but 
little  temple  against  the  precipices  of 
Libya.  And  what  is  the  result?  Simply 
that  whenever  one  looks  toward  them  one 
says,  "What  are  those  little  pillars?'" 
Or  if  one  is  more  instructed,  one  thinks 


DEIR-EL-BAHARI  151 

about  Queen  Hatshepsu.  The  precipices 
are  as  nothing.  A  woman's  wile  has  blot- 
ted them  out. 

And  yet  how  grand  they  are!  I  have 
called  them  tiger-colored  precipices.  And 
they  suggest  tawny  wild  beasts,  fierce, 
bred  in  a  land  that  is  the  prey  of  the  sun. 
Every  shade  of  orange  and  yellow  glows 
and  grows  pale  on  their  bosses,  in  their 
clefts.  They  shoot  out  turrets  of  rock 
that  blaze  like  flames  in  the  day.  They 
show  great  teeth,  like  the  tiger  when  any 
one  draws  near.  And,  like  the  tiger,  they 
seem  perpetually  informed  by  a  spirit  that 
is  angry.  Blake  wrote  of  the  tiger : 

"  Tiger,  tiger,  burning  bright 
In  the  forests  of  the  night." 

These  tiger-precipices  of  Libya  are  burn- 
ing things,  avid  like  beasts  of  prey.  But 
the  restored  apricot-coloured  pillars  are 
not  afraid  of  their  impending  fury — fury 
of  a  beast  baffled  by  a  tricky  little  woman, 
almost  it  seems  to  me ;  and  still  less  afraid 


152  DEIR-EL-BAHARI 

are  the  white  pillars,  and  the  brilliant 
paintings  that  decorate  the  walls  within. 
As  many  people  in  the  sad  but  lovely 
islands  off  the  coast  of  Scotland  believe 
in  "  doubles,"  as  the  old  classic  writers 
believed  in  man's  "  genius,"  so  the  an- 
cient Egyptian  believed  in  his  "  Ka,"  or 
separate  entity,  a  sort  of  spiritual  other 
self,  to  be  propitiated  and  ministered  to, 
presented  with  gifts,  and  served  with  en- 
ergy and  ardor.  On  this  temple  of  Deir- 
el-Bahari  is  the  scene  of  the  birth  of  Hat- 
shepsu,  and  there  are  two  babies,  the  prin- 
cess and  her  Ka.  For  this  imagined  Ka, 
when  a  great  queen,  long  after,  she  built 
this  temple,  or  chapel,  that  offerings  might 
be  made  there  on  certain  appointed  days. 
Fortunate  Ka  of  Hatshepsu  to  have  had 
so  cheerful  a  dwelling!  Liveliness  per- 
vades Deir-el-Bahari.  I  remember,  when 
I  was  on  my  first  visit  to  Egypt,  lunching 
at  Thebes  with  Monsieur  Naville  and  Mr. 
Hogarth,  and  afterward  going  with  them 
to  watch  the  digging  away  of  the  masses 


DEIR-EL-BAHARI  153 

of  sand  and  rubbish  which  concealed  this 
gracious  building.  I  remember  the  songs 
of  the  half-naked  workmen  toiling  and 
sweating  in  the  sun.  And  I  remember 
seeing  a  white  temple  wall  come  up  into 
the  light  with  all  the  painted  figures  surely 
dancing  with  joy  upon  it.  And  they  are 
surely  dancing  still. 

Here  you  may  see,  brilliant  as  yester- 
day's picture  anywhere,  fascinatingly  dec- 
orative trees  growing  bravely  in  little  pots, 
red  people  offering  incense  which  is  piled 
up  in  mounds  like  mountains,  Ptah-Seket, 
Osiris  receiving  a  royal  gift  of  wine,  the 
queen  in  the  company  of  various  divini- 
ties, and  the  terrible  ordeal  of  the  cows. 
The  cows  are  being  weighed  in  scales. 
There  are  three  of  them.  One  is  a  phil- 
osopher, and  reposes  with  an  air  that  says, 
"  Even  this  last  indignity  of  being 
weighed  against  my  will  cannot  perturb 
my  soaring  spirit."  But  the  other  two, 
sitting  up,  look  as  apprehensive  as  old 
ladies  in  a  rocking  express,  expectant  of 


154  DEIR-EL-BAHARI 

an  accident.  The  vividness  of  the  colours 
in  this  temple  is  quite  wonderful.  And 
much  of  its  great  attraction  comes  rather 
from  its  position,  and  from  them,  than  es- 
sentially from  itself.  At  Deir-el-Bahari, 
what  the  long  shell  contains — its  happy 
murmur  of  life — is  more  fascinating  than 
the  shell.  There,  instead  of  being  up- 
lifted or  overawed  by  form,  we  are  re- 
joiced by  colour,  by  the  high  vivacity  of 
arrested  movement,  by  the  story  that  col- 
our and  movement  tell.  And  over  all  there 
is  the  bright,  blue,  painted  sky,  studded, 
almost  distractedly  studded,  with  a  ple- 
thora of  the  yellow  stars  the  Egyptians 
made  like  starfish. 

The  restored  apricot-coloured  columns 
outside  look  unhappily  suburban  when  you 
are  near  them.  The  white  columns  with 
their  architraves  are  more  pleasant  to  the 
eyes.  The  niches  full  of  bright  hues,  the 
arched  chapels,  the  small  white  steps  lead- 
ing upward  to  shallow  sanctuaries,  the 
small  black  foxes  facing  each  other  on  lit- 


DEIR-EL-BAHARI  155 

tie  yellow  pedestals — attract  one  like  the 
details  and  amusing  ornaments  of  a  clever 
woman's  boudoir.  Through  this  most 
characteristic  temple  one  roves  in  a  gaily 
attentive  mood,  feeling  all  the  time  Hat- 
shepsu's  fascination. 

You  may  see  her,  if  you  will,  a  little 
lady  on  the  wall,  with  a  face  decidedly 
sensual — a  long,  straight  nose,  thick  lips, 
an  expression  rather  determined  than 
agreeable.  Her  mother  looks  as  Semitic 
as  a  Jew  moneylender  in  "Brick  Lane,  Lon- 
don. Her  husband,  Thothmes  II.,  has  a 
weak  and  poor-spirited  countenance— de- 
cidedly an  accomplished  performer  on  the 
second  violin.  The  mother  wears  on  her 
head  a  snake,  no  doubt  a  cobra-di-capello, 
the  symbol  of  her  sovereignty.  Thoth- 
mes is  clad  in  a  loin-cloth.  And  a  god, 
with  a  sleepy  expression  and  a  very  fish- 
like  head,  appears  in  this  group  of  per- 
sonages to  offer  the  key  of  life.  Another 
painting  of  the  queen  shows  her  on  her 
knees  drinking  milk  from  the  sacred  cow, 


1 56  DEIR-EL-B  AH  ARI 

with  an  intent  and  greedy  figure,  and  an 
extraordinarily  sensual  and  expressive 
face.  That  she  was  well  guarded  is  surely 
proved  by  a  brave  display  of  her  soldiers 
— red  men  on  a  white  wall.  Full  of  life 
and  gaiety,  all  in  a  row  they  come,  hold- 
ing weapons,  and,  apparently,  branches, 
and  advancing  with  a  gait  of  triumph 
that  tells  of  "  spacious  days."  And  at 
their  head  is  an  officer,  who  looks  back, 
much  like  a  modern  drill  sergeant,  to  see 
how  his  men  are  marching. 

In  the  southern  shrine  of  the  temple, 
cut  in  the  rock  as  is  the  northern  shrine, 
once  more  I  found  traces  of  the  "  Lady 
of  the  Under-World."  For  this  shrine 
was  dedicated  to  Hathor,  though  the 
whole  temple  was  sacred  to  the  Theban 
god  Amun.  Upon  a  column  were  the  re- 
mains of  the  goddess's  face,  with  a  broad 
brow  and  long,  large  eyes.  Some  fanatic 
had  hacked  away  the  mouth. 

The  tomb  of  Hatshepsu  was  found  by 
Mr.  Theodore  M.  Davis,  and  the  famous 


DEIR-EL-BAHARI  157 

Vache  of  Deir-el-Bahari  by  Monsieur 
Naville  as  lately  as  1905.  It  stands  in 
the  museum  at  Cairo,  but  for  ever  it  will 
be  connected  in  the  minds  of  men  with 
the  tiger-coloured  precipices  and  the  Col- 
onnades of  Thebes.  Behind  the  ruins  of 
the  temple  of  Mentu-Hotep  III.,  in  a 
chapel  of  painted  rock,  the  Vache-Hathor 
was  found. 

It  is  not  easy  to  convey  by  any  descrip- 
tion the  impression  this  marvellous  statue 
makes.  Many  of  us  love  our  dogs,  our 
horses,  some  of  us  adore  our  cats;  but 
which  of  us  can  think,  without  a  smile, 
of  worshipping  a  cow?  Yet  the  cow  was 
the  Egyptian  Aphrodite's  sacred  animal. 
Under  the  form  of  a  cow  she  was  often 
represented.  And  in  the  statue  she  is  pre- 
sented to  us  as  a  limestone  cow.  And 
positively  this  cow  is  to  be  worshipped. 

She  is  shown  in  the  act  apparently  of 
stepping  gravely  forward  out  of  a  small 
arched  shrine,  the  walls  of  which  are  dec- 
orated with  brilliant  paintings.  Her  colour 


158  DEIR-EL-BAHARI 

is  red  and  yellowish  red,  and  is  covered 
with  dark  blotches  of  very  dark  green, 
which  look  almost  black.  Only  one  or  two 
are  of  a  bluish  colour.  Her  height  is 
moderate.  I  stand  about  five  foot  nine, 
and  I  found  that  on  her  pedestal  the  line 
of  her  back  was  about  level  with  my  chest. 
The  lower  part  of  the  body,  much  of 
which  is  concealed  by  the  under  block  of 
limestone,  is  white,  tinged  with  yellow. 
The  tail  is  red.  Above  the  head,  open  and 
closed  lotus-flowers  form  a  head-dress, 
with  the  lunar  disk  and  two  feathers. 
And  the  long  lotus-stalks  flow  down  on 
each  side  of  the  neck  toward  the  ground. 
At  the  back  of  this  head-dress  are  a 
scarab  and  a  cartouche.  The  goddess  is 
advancing  solemnly  and  gently.  A  won- 
derful calm,  a  matchless,  serene  dignity, 
enfold  her. 

In  the  body  of  this  cow  one  is  able,  in- 
deed one  is  almost  obliged,  to  feel  the  soul 
of  a  goddess.  The  incredible  is  accom- 
plished. The  dead  Egyptian  makes  the 


DEIR-EL-BAHARI  159 

ironic,  the  sceptical  modern  world  feel 
deity  in  a  limestone  cow.  How  is  it  done  ? 
I  know  not;  but  it  is  done.  Genius  can 
do  nearly  anything,  it  seems.  Under  the 
chin  of  the  cow  there  is  a  standing  statue 
of  the  King  Mentu-Hotep,  and  beneath 
her  the  king  kneels  as  a  boy.  Wonder- 
fully expressive  and  solemnly  refined  is  the 
cow's  face,  which  is  of  a  dark  colour,  like 
the  colour  of  almost  black  earth — earth 
fertilised  by  the  Nile.  Dignified,  dom- 
inating, almost  but  just  not  stern,  strongly 
intelligent,  and,  through  its  beautiful  in- 
telligence, entirely  sympathetic  ( "  to  un- 
derstand all,  is  to  pardon  all  "),  this  face, 
once  thoroughly  seen,  completely  noticed, 
can  never  be  forgotten.  This  is  one  of 
the  most  beautiful  statues  in  the  world. 
When  I  was  at  Deir-el-Bahari  I  thought 
of  it  and  wished  that  it  still  stood  there 
near  the  Colonnades  of  Thebes  under  the 
tiger-coloured  precipices.  And  then  I 
thought  of  Hatshepsu.  Surely  she  could 
not  brook  a  rival  to-day  near  the  temple 


160  DEIR-EL-BAHARI 

which  she  made — a  rival  long  lost  and 
long  forgotten.  Is  not  her  influence  still 
there  upon  the  terraced  platforms,  among 
the  apricot  and  the  white  columns,  near 
the  paintings  of  the  land  of  Punt?  Did 
it  not  whisper  to  the  antiquaries,  even  to 
the  soldiers  from  Cairo,  who  guarded  the 
Vache-Hathor  in  the  night,  to  make  haste 
to  take  her  away  far  from  the  hills  of 
Thebes  and  from  the  Nile's  long  southern 
reaches,  that  the  great  queen  might  once 
more  reign  alone?  They  obeyed.  Hat- 
shepsu  was  appeased.  And,  like  a  deli- 
cate woman,  perfumed  and  arranged, 
clothed  in  a  creation  of  white  and  blue 
and  orange,  standing  ever  so  knowingly 
against  a  background  of  orange  and  pink, 
of  red  and  of  brown-red,  she  rules  at  Deir- 
el-Bahari. 


XIII 
THE  TOMBS  OF  THE  KINGS 

ON  the  way  to  the  tombs  of  the  kings  I 
went  to  the  temple  of  Kurna,  that  lonely 
cenotaph,  with  its  sand-coloured,  massive 
fagade,  its  heaps  of  fallen  stone,  its  wide 
and  ruined  doorway,  its  thick,  almost 
rough,  columns  recalling  Medinet-Abu. 
There  is  not  very  much  to  see,  but  from 
there  one  has  a  fine  view  of  other  temples 
— of  the  Ramesseum,  looking  superb,  like 
a  grand  skeleton;  of  Medinet-Abu,  dis- 
tant, very  pale  gold  in  the  morning  sun- 
light ;  of  little  Deirral-Medinet,  the  pretty 
child  of  the  Ptolemies,  with  the  heads  of 
the  seven  Hathors.  And  from  Kurna  the 
Colossi  are  exceptionally  grand  and  ex- 
ceptionally personal,  so  personal  that  one 
163 


164    THE  TOMBS  OF  THE  KINGS 

imagines  one  sees  the  expressions  of  the 
faces  that  they  no  longer  possess. 

Even  if  you  do  not  go  into  the  tombs — 
but  you  will  go — you  must  ride  to  the 
tombs  of  the  kings;  and  you  must,  if  you 
care  for  the  finesse  of  impressions,  ride 
on  a  blazing  day  and  toward  the  hour  of 
noon.  Then  the  ravine  is  itself,  like  the 
great  act  that  demonstrates  a  tempera- 
ment. It  is  the  narrow  home  of  fire, 
hemmed  in  by  brilliant  colours,  nearly  all 
— perhaps  quite  all — of  tvhich  could  be 
found  in  a  glowing  furnace.  Every  shade 
of  yellow  is  there — lemon  yellow,  sulphur 
yellow,  the  yellow  of  amber,  the  yellow  of 
orange  with  its  tendency  toward  red,  the 
yellow  of  gold,  sand  colour,  sun  colour. 
Cannot  all  these  yellows  be  found  in  a 
fire  ?  And  there  are  the  reds — pink  of  the 
carnation,  pink  of  the  coral,  red  of  the 
little  rose  that  grows  in  certain  places 
of  sands,  red  of  the  bright  flame's  heart. 
And  all  these  colours  are  mingled  in  com- 
plete sterility.  And  all  are  fused  into  a 


THE  TOMBS  OF  THE  KINGS    165 

fierce  brotherhood  by  the  sun.  And  like 
a  flood,  they  seem  flowing  to  the  red  and 
the  yellow  mountains,  like  a  flood  that  is 
flowing  to  its  sea.  You  are  taken  by  them 
toward  the  mountains,  on  and  on,  till  the 
world  is  closing  in,  and  you  know  the  way 
must  come  to  an  end.  And  it  comes  to 
an  end — in  a  tomb. 

You  go  to  a  door  in  the  rock,  and  a 
guardian  lets  you  in,  and  wants  to  follow 
you  in.  Prevent  him  if  you  can.  Pay 
him.  Go  in  alone.  For  this  is  the  tomb 
of  Amenhotep  II. ;  and  he  himself  is  here, 
far  down,  at  rest  under  the  mountain, 
this  king  who  lived  and  reigned  more 
than  fourteen  hundred  years  before  the 
birth  of  Christ.  The  ravine-valley  leads  to 
him,  and  you  should  go  to  him  alone.  He 
lies  in  the  heart  of  the  living  rock,  in 
the  dull  heat  of  the  earth's  bowels,  which 
is  like  no  other  heat.  You  descend  by 
stairs  and  corridors,  you  pass  over  a  well 
by  a  bridge,  you  pass  through  a  naked 
chamber ;  and  the  king  is  not  there.  And 


i66    THE  TOMBS  OF  THE  KINGS 

you  go  on  down  another  staircase,  and 
along  another  corridor,  and  you  come  into 
a  pillared  chamber,  with  paintings  on  its 
walls,  and  on  its  pillars,  paintings  of  the 
king  in  the  presence  of  the  gods  of  the 
underworld,  under  stars  in  a  soft  blue  sky. 
And  below  you,  shut  in  on  the  farther 
side  by  the  solid  mountain  in  whose  breast 
you  have  all  this  time  been  walking,  there 
is  a  crypt.  And  you  turn  away  from  the 
bright  paintings,  and  down  there  you  see 
the  king. 

Many  years  ago  in  London  I  went  to 
the  private  view  of  the  Royal  Academy 
at  Burlington  House.  I  went  in  the  after- 
noon, when  the  galleries  were  crowded 
with  politicians  and  artists,  with  dealers, 
gossips,  quidnuncs,  and  flaneurs;  with 
authors,  fashionable  lawyers,  and  doctors ; 
with  men  and  women  of  the  world;  with 
young  dandies  and  actresses  en  vogue. 
A  roar  of  voices  went  up  to  the  roof. 
Every  one  was  talking,  smiling,  laughing, 
commenting,  and  criticising.  It  was  a 


THE  TOMBS  OF  THE  KINGS    167 

little  picture  of  the  very  worldly  world 
that  loves  the  things  of  to-day  and  the 
chime  of  the  passing  hours.  And  sud- 
denly some  people  near  me  were  silent, 
and  some  turned  their  heads  to  stare  with 
a  strangely  fixed  attention.  And  I  saw 
coming  toward  me  an  emaciated  figure, 
rather  bent,  much  drawn  together,  walk- 
ing slowly  on  legs  like  sticks.  It  was  clad 
in  black,  with  a  gleam  of  colour.  Above 
it  was  a  face  so  intensely  thin  that  it  was 
like  the  face  of  death.  And  in  this  face 
shone  two  eyes  that  seemed  full  of — the 
other  world.  And,  like  a  breath  from  the 
other  world  passing,  this  man  went  by  me 
and  was  hidden  from  me  by  the  throng. 
It  was  Cardinal  Manning  in  the  last  days 
of  his  life. 

The  face  of  this  king  is  like  his,  but  it 
has  an  even  deeper  pathos  as  it  looks  up- 
ward to  the  rock.  And  the  king's  silence 
bids  you  be  silent,  and  his  immobility  bids 
you  be  still.  And  his  sad,  and  unutterable 
resignation  sifts  awe,  as  by  the  desert 


i68    THE  TOMBS  OF  THE  KINGS 

wind  the  sand  is  sifted  into  the  temples, 
into  the  temple  of  your  heart.  And  you 
feel  the  touch  of  time,  but  the  touch  of 
eternity,  too.  And  as,  in  that  rock-hewn 
sanctuary,  you  whisper  "  Pax  vobiscum," 
you  say  it  for  all  the  world. 


EDFU 


XIV 
EDFU 

PRAYER  pervades  the  East.  Far  off 
across  the  sands,  when  one  is  travelling 
in  the  desert,  one  sees  thin  minarets  ris- 
ing toward  the  sky.  A  desert*  city  is 
there.  It  signals  its  presence  by  this  mute 
appeal  to  Allah.  And  where  there  are  no 
minarets — in  the  great  wastes  of  the 
dunes,  in  the  eternal  silence,  the  lifeless- 
ness  that  is  not  broken  even  by  any  lonely, 
wandering  bird — the  camels  are  stopped 
at  the  appointed  hours,  the  poor,  and  often 
ragged,  robes  are  laid  down,  the  brown 
pilgrims  prostrate  themselves  in  prayer. 
And  the  rich  man  spreads  his  carpet,  and 
prays.  And  the  half-naked  nomad 
spreads  nothing;  but  he  prays,  too.  The 
East  is  full  of  lust,  and  full  of  money- 
171 


172  EDFU 

getting,  and  full  of  bartering,  and  full  of 
violence ;  but  it  is  full  of  worship — of  wor- 
ship that  disdains  concealment,  that  recks 
not  of  ridicule  or  comment,  that  believes 
too  utterly  to  care  if  others  disbelieve. 
There  are  in  the  East  many  men  who  do 
not  pray.  They  do  not  laugh  at  the  man 
who  does,  like  the  unpraying  Christian. 
There  is  nothing  ludicrous  to  them  in 
prayer.  In  Egypt  your  Nubian  sailor 
prays  in  the  stern  of  your  dahabiyeh; 
and  your  Egyptian  boatman  prays  by  the 
rudder  of  your  boat ;  and  your  black  don- 
key-boy prays  behind  a  red  rock  in  the 
sand;  and  your  camel-man  prays  when 
you  are  resting  in  the  noontide,  watch- 
ing the  far-off  quivering  mirage,  lost  in 
some  wayward  dream. 

And  must  you  not  pray,  too,  when  you 
enter  certain  temples  where  once  strange 
gods  were  worshipped  in  whom  no  man 
now  believes? 

There  is  one  temple  on  the  Nile  which 
seems  to  embrace  in  its  arms  all  the  wor- 


EDFU  173 

ship  of  the  past ;  to  be  full  of  prayers  and 
solemn  praises ;  to  be  the  holder,  the  noble 
keeper,  of  the  sacred  longings,  of  the 
unearthly  desires  and  aspirations,  of  the 
dead.  It  is  the  temple  of  Edfu.  From  all 
the  other  temples  it  stands  apart.  It  is 
the  temple  of  the  inward  flame,  of  the 
secret  soul  of  man ;  of  that  mystery  with- 
in us  that  is  exquisitely  sensitive,  and  ex- 
quisitely alive;  that  has  longings  it  can- 
not tell,  and  sorrows  it  dare  not  whisper, 
and  loves  it  can  only  love. 

To  Horus  it  was  dedicated — hawk- 
headed  Horus — the  son  of  Isis  and  Osiris, 
who  was  crowned  with  many  crowns,  who 
was  the  young  Apollo  of  the  old  Egyptian 
world.  But  though  I  know  this,  I  am 
never  able  to  associate  Edfu  with  Horus, 
that  child  wearing  the  side-lock — when 
he  is  not  hawk-headed  in  his  solar  aspect 
— that  boy  with  his  finger  in  his  mouth, 
that  youth  who  fought  against  Set,  mur- 
derer of  his  father. 

Edfu,  in  its  solemn  beauty,  in  its  per- 


174 

fection  of  form,  seems  to  me  to  pass  into 
a  region  altogether  beyond  identification 
with  the  worship  of  any  special  deity,  with 
particular  attributes,  perhaps  with  partic- 
ular limitations;  one  who  can  be  graven 
upon  walls,  and  upon  architraves  and  pil- 
lars painted  in  brilliant  colours;  one  who 
can  personally  pursue  a  criminal,  like 
some  policeman  in  the  street;  even  one 
who  can  rise  upon  the  world  in  the  visi- 
ble glory  of  the  sun.  To  me,  Edfu  must 
always  represent  the  world-worship  of 
"  the  Hidden  One  " ;  not  Amun,  god  of 
the  dead,  fused  with  Ra,  with  Amsu,  or 
with  Khnum :  but  that  other  "  Hidden 
One,"  who  is  God  of  the  happy  hunting- 
ground  of  savages,  with  whom  the  Bud- 
dhist strives  to  merge  his  strange  serenity 
of  soul ;  who  is  adored  in  the  "  Holy 
Places  "  by  the  Moslem,  and  lifted  mysti- 
cally above  the  heads  of  kneeling  Catho- 
lics in  cathedrals  dim  with  incense,  and 
merrily  praised  with  the  banjo  and  the 
trumpet  in  the  streets  of  black  English 


EDFU  175 

cities ;  who  is  asked  for  children  by  long- 
ing -women,  and  for  new  dolls  by  lisping 
babes ;  whom  the  atheist  denies  in  the  day, 
and  fears  in  the  darkness  of  night;* who 
is  on  the  lips  alike  of  priest  and  blasphe- 
mer, and  in  the  soul  of  all  human  life. 

Edfu  stands  alone,  not  near  any  other 
temple.  It  is  not  pagan;  it  is  not 
Christian:  it  is  a  place  in  which  to  wor- 
ship according  to  the  dictates  of  your 
heart. 

Edfu  stands  alone  on  the  bank  of  the 
Nile  between  Luxor  and  Assuan.  It  is 
not  very  far  from  El-Kab,  once  the  capi- 
tal of  Upper  Egypt,  and  it  is  about  two 
thousand  years  old.  The  building  of  it 
took  over  one  hundred  and  eighty  years, 
and  it  is  the  most  perfectly  preserved  tem- 
ple to-day  of  all  the  antique  world.  It  is 
huge  and  it  is  splendid.  It  has  towers 
one  hundred  and  twelve  feet  high,  a  prop- 
ylon  two  hundred  and  fifty- two  feet 
broad,  and  walls  four  hundred  and  fifty 
feet  long.  Begun  in  .the  reign  of  Ptolemy 


1 76  EDFU 

III.,  it  was  completed  only  fifty-seven 
years  before  the  birth  of  Christ. 

You  know  these  facts  about  it,  and  you 
forget  them,  or  at  least  you  do  not  think 
of  them.  What  does  all  that  matter  when 
you  are  alone  in  Edfu?  Let  the  antiqua- 
rian go  with  his  anxious  nose  almost 
touching  the  stone;  let  the  Egyptologist 
peer  through  his  glasses  at  hieroglyphs 
and  puzzle  out  the  meaning  of  cartouches : 
but  let  us  wander  at  ease,  and  worship, 
and  regard  the  exquisite  form,  and  drink 
in  the  mystical  spirit,  of  this  very  wonder- 
ful temple. 

Do  you  care  about  form?  Here  you 
will  find  it  in  absolute  perfection.  Edfu 
is  the  consecration  of  form.  In  propor- 
tion it  is  supreme  above  all  other  Egyp- 
tian temples.  Its  beauty  of  form  is  like 
a  music.  Its  design  afifects  one  like  the 
chiselled  loveliness  of  a  perfect  sonnet. 
While  the  world  lasts,  no  architect  can 
arise  to  create  a  building  more  satisfying, 
more  calm  with  the  calm  of  faultlessness, 


EDFU  177 

more  serene  with  a  just  serenity.  Or  so 
it  seems  to  me.  I  think  of  the  most  lovely 
buildings  I  know  in  Europe — of  the  Al- 
hambra  at  Granada,  of  the  Cappella  Pala- 
tina  in  the  palace  at  Palermo.  And  Edfu 
I  place  with  them — Edfu  utterly  different 
from  them,  more  different,  perhaps,  even 
than  they  are  from  each  other,  but  akin  to 
them,  as  all  great  beauty  is  mysteriously 
akin.  I  have  spent  morning  after  morning 
in  the  Alhambra,  and  many  and  many  an 
hour  in  the  Cappella  Palatina;  and  never 
have  I  been  weary  of  either,  or  longed  to 
go  away.  And  this  same  sweet  desire  to 
stay  came  over  me  in  Edfu.  The  Loulia 
was  tied  up  by  the  high  bank  of  the 
Nile.  The  sailors  were  glad  to  rest. 
There  was  no  steamer  sounding  its  hid- 
eous siren  to  call  me  to  its  crowded  deck. 
So  I  yielded  to  my  desire,  and  for  long  I 
stayed  in  Edfu.  And  when  at  last  I  left 
it  I  said  to  myself,  "  This  is  a  supreme 
thing,"  and  I  knew  that  within  me  had 
suddenly  developed  the  curious  passion 


178  EDFU 

for  building's  that  some  people  never  feel, 
and  that  others  feel  ever  growing  and 
growing. 

Yes,  Edfu  is  supreme.  No  alteration 
could  improve  it.  Any  change  made  in 
it,  however  slight,  could  only  be  harmful 
to  it.  Pure  and  perfect  is  its  design — 
broad  propylon,  great  open  courtyard  with 
pillared  galleries,  halls,  chambers,  sanc- 
tuary. Its  dignity  and  its  sobriety  are 
matchless.  I  know  they  must  be,  because 
they  touched  me  so  strangely,  with  a  kind 
of  reticent  enchantment,  and  I  am  not  by 
nature  enamoured  of  sobriety,  of  reticence 
and  calm,  but  am  inclined  to  delight  in 
almost  violent  force,  in  brilliance,  and,  es- 
pecially, in  combinations  of  colour.  In  the 
Alhambra  one  finds  both  force  and  fairy- 
like  lightness,  delicious  proportions,  deli- 
cate fantasy,  a  spell  as  of  subtle  magi- 
cians; in  the  Cappella  Palatina,  a  jewelled 
splendour,  combined  with  a  small  perfec- 
tion of  form  which  simply  captivates  the 
whole  spirit  and  leads  it  to  adoration.  In 


EDFU  179 

Edfu  you  are  face  to  face  with  hugeness 
and  with  grandeur;  but  soon  you  are 
scarcely  aware  of  either — in  the  sense,  at 
least,  that  connects  these  qualities  with  a 
certain  overwhelming,  almost  striking 
down,  of  the  spirit  and  the  faculties. 
What  you  are  aware  of  is  your  own  im- 
mense and  beautiful  calm  of  utter  satis- 
faction— a  calm  which  has  quietly  inun- 
dated you,  like  a  waveless  tide  of  the  sea. 
How  rare  it  is  to  feel  this  absolute  satis- 
faction, this  praising  serenity !  The  criti- 
cal spirit  goes,  like  a  bird  from  an  opened 
window.  The  excited,  laudatory,  voluble 
spirit  goes.  And  this  splendid  calm  is 
left.  If  you  stay  here,  you,  as  this  tem- 
ple has  been,  will  be  moulded  into  a  beau- 
tiful sobriety.  From  the  top  of  the  pylon 
you  have  received  this  still  and  glorious 
impression  from  the  matchless  design  of 
the  whole  building,  which  you  see  best 
from  there.  When  you  descend  the  shal- 
low staircase,  when  you  stand  in  the  great 
court,  when  you  go  into  the  shadowy 


i8o  EDFU 

halls,  then  it  is  that  the  utter  satisfaction 
within  you  deepens.  Then  it  is  that  you 
feel  the  need  to  worship  in  this  place 
created  for  worship. 

The  ancient  Egyptians  made  most  of 
their  temples  in  conformity  with  a  single 
type.  The  sanctuary  was  the  heart,  the 
core,  of  each  temple — the  sanctuary  sur- 
rounded by  the  chambers  in  which  were 
laid  up  the  precious  objects  connected 
with  ceremonies  and  sacrifices.  Leading 
to  this  core  of  the  temple,  which  was 
sometimes  called  "  the  divine  house,"  were 
various  halls  the  roofs  of  which  were  sup- 
ported by  columns — those  hypostyle  halls 
which  one  sees  perpetually  in  Egypt.  Be- 
fore the  first  of  these  halls  was  a  court- 
yard surrounded  by  a  colonnade.  In  the 
courtyard  the  priests  of  the  temple  as- 
sembled. The  people  were  allowed  to  en- 
ter the  colonnade.  A  gateway  with  tow- 
ers gave  entrance  to  the  courtyard.  If 
one  visits  many  of  the  Egyptian  temples, 
one  soon  becomes  aware  of  the  subtlety, 


EDFU  181 

combined  with  a  sort  of  high  simplicity 
and  sense  of  mystery  and  poetry,  of  these 
builders  of  the  past.  As  a  great  writer 
leads  one  on,  with  a  concealed  but  beau- 
tiful art,  from  the  first  words  of  his  story 
to  the  last — the  last  words  to  which  all 
the  other  words  are  ministering  servants ; 
as  the  great  musician — Wagner  in  his 
"  Meistersinger,"  for  instance — leads  one 
from  the  first  notes  of  his  score  to  those 
final  notes  which  magnificently  reveal  to 
the  listeners  the  real  meaning  of  those 
first  notes,  and  of  all  the  notes  which  fol- 
low them:  so  the  Egyptian  builders  lead 
the  spirit  gently,  mysteriously  forward 
from  the  gateway  between  the  towers  to 
the  distant  house  divine.  When  one  en- 
ters the  outer  court,  one  feels  the  far-off 
sanctuary.  Almost  unconsciously  one  is 
aware  that  for  that  sanctuary  all  the  rest 
of  the  temple  was  created;  that  to  that 
sanctuary  everything  tends.  And  in  spirit 
one  is  drawn  softly  onward  to  that  very 
holy  place.  Slowly,  perhaps,  the  body 


182  EDFU 

moves  from  courtyard  to  hypostyle  hall, 
and  from  one  hall  to  another.  Hiero- 
glyphs are  examined,  cartouches  puzzled 
out,  paintings  of  processions,  or  bas-re- 
liefs of  pastimes  and  of  sacrifices,  looked 
at  with  care  and  interest ;  but  all  the  time 
one  has  the  sense  of  waiting,  of  a  want 
unsatisfied.  And  only  when  one  at  last 
reaches  the  sanctuary  is  one  perfectly  at 
rest.  For  then  the  spirit  feels :  "  This 
is  the  meaning  of  it  all." 

One  of  the  means  which  the  Egyptian 
architects  used  to  create  this  sense  of  ap- 
proach is  very  simple,  but  perfectly  effec- 
tive. It  consisted  only  in  making  each 
hall  on  a  very  slightly  higher  level  than 
the  one  preceding  it,  and  the  sanctuary, 
which  is  narrow  and  mysteriously  dark, 
on  the  highest  level  of  all.  Each  time  one 
takes  an  upward  step,  or  walks  up  a  little 
incline  of  stone,  the  body  seems  to  con- 
vey to  the  soul  a  deeper  message  of  rev- 
erence and  awe.  In  no  other  temple  is 
this  sense  of  approach  to  the  heart  of  a 


EDFU  183 

thing  so  acute  as  it  is  when  one  walks  in 
Edf  u.  In  no  other  temple,  when  the  sanc- 
tuary is  reached,  has  one  such  a  strong 
consciousness  of  being  indeed  within  a 
sacred  heart. 

The  colour  of  Edfu  is  a  pale  and  deli- 
cate brown,  warm  in  the  strong  sunshine, 
but  seldom  glowing.  Its  first  doorway  is 
extraordinarily  high,  and  is  narrow,  but 
very  deep,  with  a  roof  showing  traces  of 
that  delicious,  clear  blue-green  which  is 
like  a  thin  cry  of  joy  rising  up  in  the  sol- 
emn temples  of  Egypt.  A  small  sphinx 
keeps  watch  on  the  right,  just  where  the 
guardian  stands;  this  guardian,  the  gift 
of  the  past,  squat,  even  fat,  with  a  very 
perfect  face  of  a  determined  and  hand- 
some man.  In  the  court,  upon  a  pedestal, 
stands  a  big  bird,  and  near  it  is  another 
bird,  or  rather  half  of  a  bird,  leaning  for- 
ward, and  much  defaced.  And  in  this 
great  courtyard  there  are  swarms  of  liv- 
ing birds,  twittering  in  the  sunshine. 
Through  the  doorway  between  the  towers 


1 84  EDFU 

one  sees  a  glimpse  of  a  native  village  with 
the  cupolas  of  a  mosque. 

I  stood  and  looked  at  the  cupolas  for  a 
moment.  Then  I  turned,  and  forgot  for 
a  time  the  life  of  the  world  without — that 
men,  perhaps,  were  praying  beneath  those 
cupolas,  or  praising  the  Moslem's  God. 
For  when  I  turned,  I  felt,  as  I  have  said, 
as  if  all  the  worship  of  the  world  must  be 
concentrated  here.  Standing  far  down  the 
open  court,  in  the  full  sunshine,  I  could 
see  into  the  first  hypostyle  hall,  but  be- 
yond only  a  darkness — a  darkness  which 
led  me  on,  in  which  the  further  chambers 
of  the  house  divine  were  hidden.  As  I 
went  on  slowly,  the  perfection  of  the  plan 
of  the  dead  architects  was  gradually  re- 
vealed to  me,  when  the  darkness  gave  up 
its  secrets;  when  I  saw  not  clearly,  but 
dimly,  the  long  way  between  the  columns, 
the  noble  columns  themselves,  the  gradual, 
slight  upward  slope — graduated  by  gen- 
ius; there  is  no  other  word — which  led 
to  the  sanctuary,  seen  at  last  as  a  little 


EDFU  185 

darkness,  in  which  all  the  mystery  of  wor- 
ship, and  of  the  silent  desires  of  men,  was 
surely  concentrated,  and  kept  by  the  stone 
for  ever.  Even  the  succession  of  the  dark- 
nesses, like  shadows  growing  deeper  and 
deeper,  seemed  planned  by  some  great  ar- 
tist in  the  management  of  light,  and  so 
of  shadow  effects.  The  perfection  of 
form  is  in  Edfu,  impossible  to  describe, 
impossible  not  to  feel.  The  tremendous 
effect  it  has — an  effect  upon  the  soul — is 
created  by  a  combination  of  shapes,  of 
proportions,  of  different  levels,  of  differ- 
ent heights,  by  consummate  graduation. 
And  these  shapes,  proportions,  different 
levels,  and  heights,  are  seen  in  dimness. 
Not  that  jewelled  dimness  one  loves  in 
Gothic  cathedrals,  but  the  heavy  dimness 
of  windowless,  mighty  chambers  lighted 
only  by  a  rebuked  daylight  ever  trying 
to  steal  in.  One  is  captured  by  no  orna- 
ment, seduced  by  no  lovely  colours.  Better 
than  any  ornament,  greater  than  any  ra- 
diant glory  of  colour,  is  this  massive  aus- 


i86  EDFU 

terity.  It  is  like  the  ultimate  in  an  art. 
Everything  has  been  tried,  every  strange- 
ness bizarrerie,  absurdity,  every  wild 
scheme  of  hues,  every  preposterous  sub- 
ject— to  take  an  extreme  instance,  a 
camel,  wearing  a  top-hat,  and  lighted  up 
by  fire-works,  which  I  saw  recently  in  a 
picture-gallery  of  Munich.  And  at  the 
end  a  genius  paints  a  portrait  of  a 
wrinkled  old  woman's  face,  and  the  world 
regards  and  worships.  Or  all  discords 
have  been  flung  together  pell-mell,  resolu- 
tion of  them  has  been  deferred  perpet- 
ually, perhaps  even  denied  altogether, 
chord  of  B  major  has  been  struck  with 
C  major,  works  have  closed  upon  the 
leading  note  or  the  dominant  seventh, 
symphonies  have  been  composed  to  be 
played  in  the  dark,  or  to  be  accompanied 
by  a  magic-lantern's  efforts,  operas  been 
produced  which  are  merely  carnage  and 
a  row — and  at  the  end  a  genius  writes  a 
little  song,  and  the  world  gives  the  tribute 
of  its  breathless  silence  and  its  tears. 


EDFU  187 

And  it  knows  that  though  other  things 
may  be  done,  better  things  can  never  be 
done.  For  no  perfection  can  exceed  any 
other  perfection. 

And  so  in  Edf u  I  feel  that  this  untinted 
austerity  is  perfect;  that  whatever  may 
be  done  in  architecture  during  future  ages 
of  the  world,  Edfu,  while  it  lasts,  will 
remain  a  thing  supreme — supreme  in 
form  and,  because  of  this  supremacy,  su- 
preme in  the  spell  which  it  casts  upon  the 
soul. 

The  sanctuary  is  just  a  small,  beauti- 
fully proportioned,  inmost  chamber,  with 
a  black  roof,  containing  a  sort  of  altar 
of  granite,  and  a  great  polished  granite 
shrine  which  no  doubt  once  contained  the 
god  Horus.  I  am  glad  he  is  not  there 
now.  How  far  more  impressive  it  is  to 
stand  in  an  empty  sanctuary  in  the  house 
divine  of  "  the  Hidden  One,"  whom  the 
nations  of  the  earth  worship,  whether  they 
spread  their  robes  on  the  sand  and  turn 
their  faces  to  Mecca,  or  beat  the  tarn- 


i88  EDFU 

bourine  and  sing  "  glory  hymns  "  of  sal- 
vation, or  flagellate  themselves  in  the 
night  before  the  patron  saint  of  the  Pas- 
sionists,  or  only  gaze  at  the  snow-white 
plume  that  floats  from  the  snows  of  Etna 
under  the  rose  of  dawn,  and  feel  the  soul 
behind  Nature.  Among  the  temples  of 
Egypt,  Edfu  is  the  house  divine  of  "  the 
Hidden  One,"  the  perfect  temple  of  wor- 
ship. 


KOM   OMBOS 


XVi 
KOM   OMBOS 

SOME:  people  talk  of  the  "  sameness  "  of 
the  Nile;  and  there  is  a  lovely  sameness 
of  golden  light,  of  delicious  air,  of  peo- 
ple, and  of  scenery.  For  Egypt  is,  after 
all,  mainly  a  great  river  with  strips  on 
each  side  of  cultivated  land,  flat,  green, 
not  very  varied.  River,  green  plains,  yel- 
low plains,  pink,  brown,  steel-grey,  or 
pale-yellow  mountains,  wail  of  shadoof, 
wail  of  sakieh.  Yes,  I  suppose  there  is 
a  sameness,  a  sort  of  golden  monotony, 
in  this  land  pervaded  with  light  and  per- 
vaded with  sound.  Always  there  is  light 
around  you,  and  you  are  bathing  in  it, 
and  nearly  always,  if  you  are  living,  as  I 
was,  on  the  water,  there  is  a  multitude  of 
mingling  sounds  floating,  floating  to  your 
191 


I92  KOM    OMBOS 

ears.  As  there  are  two  lines  of  green 
land,  two  lines  of  mountains,  following  the 
course  of  the  Nile;  so  are  there  two  lines 
of  voices  that  cease  their  calling  and  their 
singing  only  as  you  draw  near  to  Nubia. 
For  then,  with  the  green  land,  they  fade 
away,  these  miles  upon  miles  of  calling 
and  singing  brown  men;  and  amber  and 
ruddy  sands  creep  downward  to  the  Nile. 
And  the  air  seems  subtly  changing,  and 
the  light  perhaps  growing  a  little  harder. 
And  you  are  aware  of  other  regions  un- 
like those  you  are  leaving,  more  African, 
more  savage,  less  suave,  less  like  a  dream- 
ing. And  especially  the  silence  makes  a 
great  impression  on  you.  But  before  you 
enter  this  silence,  between  the  amber  and 
ruddy  walls  that  will  lead  you  on  to  Nu- 
bia, and  to  the  land  of  the  crocodile,  you 
have  a  visit  to  pay.  For  here,  high  up 
on  a  terrace,  looking  over  a  great  bend 
of  the  river,  is  Kom  Ombos.  And  Kom 
Ombos  is  the  temple  of  the  crocodile  god. 
Sebek  was  one  of  the  oldest  and  one  of 


KOM    OMBOS  193 

the  most  evil  of  the  Egyptian  gods.  In 
the  Fayum  he  was  worshipped,  as  well  as 
at  Kom  Ombos,  and  there,  in  the  holy  lake 
of  his  temple,  were  numbers  of  holy  croco- 
diles, which  Strabo  tells  us  were  decor- 
ated with  jewels  like  pretty  women.  He 
did  not  get  on  with  the  other  gods,  and 
was  sometimes  confused  with  Set,  who 
personified  natural  darkness,  and  who  also 
was  worshipped  by  the  people  about  Kom 
Ombos. 

I  have  spoken  of  the  golden  sameness 
of  the  Nile,  but  this  sameness  is  broken 
by  the  variety  of  the  temples.  Here  you 
have  a  striking  instance  of  this  variety. 
Edfu,  only  forty  miles  from  Kom  Ombos, 
the  next  temple  which  you  visit,  is  the 
most  perfect  temple  in  Egypt.  Kom  Om- 
bos is  one  of  the  most  imperfect.  Edfu 
is  a  divine  house  of  "  the  Hidden  One," 
full  of  a  sacred  atmosphere.  Kom  Om- 
bos is  the  house  of  crocodiles.  In  ancient 
days  the  inhabitants  of  Edfu  abhorred, 
above  everything,  crocodiles  and  their 


194  KOM    OMBOS 

worshippers.  And  here  at  Kom  Ombos 
the  crocodile  was  adored.  You  are  in  a 
different  atmosphere. 

As  soon  as  you  land,  you  are  greeted 
with  crocodiles,  though  fortunately  not  by 
them.  A  heap  of  their  black  mummies  is 
shown  to  you  reposing  in  a  sort  of  tomb 
or  shrine  open  at  one  end  to  the  air.  By 
these  mummies  the  new  note  is  loudly 
struck.  The  crocodiles  have  carried  you 
in  an  instant  from  that  which  is  pervad- 
ingly  general  to  that  which  is  narrowly 
particular;  from  the  purely  noble,  which 
seems  to  belong  to  all  time,  to  the  en- 
tirely barbaric,  which  belongs  only  to 
times  outworn.  It  is  difficult  to  feel  as  if 
one  had  anything  in  common  with  men 
who  seriously  worshipped  crocodiles,  had 
priests  to  feed  them,  and  decorated  their 
scaly  necks  with  jewels. 

Yet  the  crocodile  god  had  a  noble  tem- 
ple at  Kom  Ombos,  a  temple  which  dates 
from  the  times  of  the  Ptolemies,  though 
there  was  a  temple  in  earlier  days  which 


KOM   OMBOS  195 

has  now  disappeared.  Its  situation  is 
splendid.  It  stands  high  above  the  Nile, 
and  close  to  the  river,  on  a  terrace  which 
has  recently  been  constructed  to  save  it 
from  the  encroachments  of  the  water. 
And  it  looks  down  upon  a  view  which  is 
exquisite  in  the  clear  light  of  early  morn- 
ing. On  the  right,  and  far  off,  is  a  deli- 
cious pink  bareness  of  distant  flats  and 
hills.  Opposite  there  is  a  flood  of  verdure 
and  of  trees  going  to  mountains,  a  spit  of 
sand  where  is  an  inlet  of  the  river,  with  a 
crowd  of  native  boats,  perhaps  waiting  for 
a  wind.  On  the  left  is  the  big  bend  of 
the  Nile,  singularly  beautiful,  almost  vol- 
uptuous in  form,  and  girdled  with  a  ra- 
diant green  of  crops,  with  palm-trees,  and 
again  the  distant  hills.  Sebek  was  well 
advised  to  have  his  temples  here  and  in 
the  glorious  Fayum,  that  land  flowing 
with  milk  and  honey,  where  the  air  is  full 
of  the  voices  of  the  flocks  and  herds,  and 
alive  with  the  wild  pigeons;  where  the 
sweet  sugar-cane  towers  up  in  fairy  for- 


196  KOM    OMBOS 

ests,  the  beloved  home  of  the  jackal; 
where  the  green  corn  waves  to  the  hori- 
zon, and  the  runlets  of  water  make  a 
maze  of  silver  threads  carrying  life  and 
its  happy  murmur  through  all  the  vast 
oasis. 

At  the  guardian's  gate  by  which  you 
go  in  there  sits,  not  a  watch  dog,  nor  yet 
a  crocodile,  but  a  watch  cat,  small,  but 
very  determined,  and  very  attentive  to  its 
duties,  and  neatly  carved  in  stone.  You 
try  to  look  like  a  crocodile-worshipper. 
It  is  deceived,  and  lets  you  pass.  And  you 
are  alone  with  the  growing  morning  and 
Kom  Ombos. 

I  was  never  taken,  caught  up  into  an 
atmosphere,  in  Kom  Ombos.  I  examined 
it  with  interest,  but  I  did  not  feel  a  spell. 
Its  grandeur  is  great,  but  it  did  not  af- 
fect me  as  did  the  grandeur  of  Karnak. 
Its  nobility  cannot  be  questioned,  but  I 
did  not  stilly  rejoice  in  it,  as  in  the  no- 
bility of  Luxor,  or  the  free  splendour  of 
the  Ramesseum. 


KOM    OMBOS  197 

The  oldest  thing  at  Kom  Ombos  is  a 
gateway  of  sandstone  placed  there  by 
Thothmes  III.  as  a  tribute  to  Sebek.  The 
great  temple  is  of  a  warm-brown  colour, 
a  very  rich  and  particularly  beautiful 
brown,  that  soothes  and  almost  comforts 
the  eyes  that  have  been  for  many  days 
boldly  assaulted  by  the  sun.  Upon  the 
terrace  platform  above  the  river  you  face 
a  low  and  ruined  wall,  on  which  there  are 
some  lively  reliefs,  beyond  which  is  a 
large,  open  court  containing  a  quantity 
of  stunted,  once  big  columns  standing  on 
big  bases.  Immediately  before  you  the 
temple  towers  up,  very  gigantic,  very  ma- 
jestic, with  a  stone  pavement,  walls  on 
which  still  remain  some  traces  of  paint- 
ings, and  really  grand  columns,  enor- 
mous in  size  and  in  good  formation. 
There  are  fine  architraves,  and  some  bits 
of  roofing,  but  the  greater  part  is  open 
to  the  air.  Through  a  doorway  is  a  sec- 
ond hall  containing  columns  much  less 
noble,  and  beyond  this  one  walks  in  ruin, 


198  KOM    OMBOS 

among  crumbled  or  partly  destroyed 
chambers,  broken  statues,  become  mere 
slabs  of  granite  and  fallen  blocks  of  stone. 
At  the  end  is  a  wall,  with  a  pavement  bor- 
dering it,  and  a  row  of  chambers  that  look 
like  monkish  cells,  closed  by  small  doors. 
At  Kom  Ombos  there  are  two  sanctuaries, 
one  dedicated  to  Sebek,  the  other  to  Heru- 
ur,  or  Haroeris,  a  form  of  Horus  in 
Egyptian  called  "  the  Elder,"  which  was 
worshipped  with  Sebek  here  by  the  ad- 
mirers of  crocodiles.  Each  of  them  con- 
tains a  pedestal  of  granite  upon  which 
once  rested  a  sacred  bark  bearing  an  im- 
age of  the  deity. 

There  are  some  fine  reliefs  scattered 
through  these  mighty  ruins,  showing  Se- 
bek with  the  head  of  a  crocodile,  Heru-ur 
with  the  head  of  a  hawk  so  characteristic 
of  Horus,  and  one  strange  animal  which 
has  no  fewer  than  four  heads,  apparently 
meant  for  the  heads  of  lions.  One  relief 
which  I  specially  noticed  for  its  life,  its 
charming  vivacity,  and  its  almost  amus- 


KOM    OMBOS  199 

ing  fidelity  to  details  unchanged  to-day, 
depicts  a  number  of  ducks  in  full  flight 
near  a  mass  of  lotus-flowers.  I  remem- 
bered it  one  day  in  the  Fayum,  so  inti- 
mately associated  with  Sebek,  when  I  rode 
twenty  miles  out  from  camp  on  a  drome- 
dary to  the  end  of  the  great  lake  of  Ku- 
run,  where  the  sand  wastes  of  the  Libyan 
desert  stretch  to  the  pale  and  waveless 
waters  which,  that  day,  looked  curiously 
desolate  and  even  sinister  under  a  low, 
grey  sky.  Beyond  the  wiry  tamarisk- 
bushes,  which  grow  far  out  from  the 
shore,  thousands  upon  thousands  of  wild 
duck  were  floating  as  far  as  the  eyes  could 
see.  We  took  a  strange  native  boat, 
manned  by  two  half-naked  fishermen,  and 
were  rowed  with  big,  broad-bladed  oars 
out  upon  the  silent  flood  that  the  silent 
desert  surrounded.  But  the  duck  were 
too  wary  ever  to  let  us  get  within  range 
of  them.  As  we  drew  gently  near,  they 
rose  in  black  throngs,  and  skimmed  low 
into  the  distance  of  the  wintry  landscape, 


200  KOM    OMBOS 

trailing  their  legs  behind  them,  like  the 
duck  on  the  wall  of  Kom  Ombos.  There 
was  no  duck  for  dinner  in  camp  that 
night,  and  the  cook  was  inconsolable.  But 
I  had  seen  a  relief  come  to  life,  and  sur- 
mounted my  disappointment. 

Kom  Ombos  and  Edfu,  the  two  houses 
of  the  lovers  and  haters  of  crocodiles,  or 
at  least  of  the  lovers  and  the  haters  of 
their  worship,  I  shall  always  think  of 
them  together,  because  I  drifted  on  the 
Loulia  from  one  to  the  other,  and  saw  no 
interesting  temple  between  them,  and  be- 
cause their  personalities  are  as  opposed 
as  were,  centuries  ago,  the  tenets  of  those 
who  adored  within  them.  The  Egyptians 
of  old  were  devoted  to  the  hunting  of 
crocodiles,  which  once  abounded  in  the 
reaches  of  the  Nile  between  Assuan  and 
Luxor,  and  also  much  lower  down.  But 
I  believe  that  no  reliefs,  or  paintings,  of 
this  sport  are  to  be  found  upon  the  walls 
of  the  temples  and  the  tombs.  The  fear 
of  Sebek,  perhaps,  prevailed  even  over  the 


KOM   OMBOS  201 

dwellers  about  the  temple  of  Edfu.  Yet 
how  could  fear  of  any  crocodile  god  in- 
fect the  souls  of  those  who  were  privi- 
leged to  worship  in  such  a  temple,  or  even 
reverently  to  stand  under  the  colonnade 
within  the  court?  As  well,  perhaps,  one 
might  ask  how  men  could  be  inspired  to 
raise  such  a  perfect  building  to  a  deity 
with  the  face  of  a  hawk  ?  But  Horus  was 
not  the  god  of  crocodiles,  but  a  god  of  the 
sun.  And  his  power  to  inspire  men  must 
have  been  vast;  for  the  greatest  concep- 
tion in  stone  in  Egypt,  and,  I  suppose,  in 
the  whole  world,  the  Sphinx,  as  De  Rouge 
proved  by  an  inscription  at  Edfu,  was  a 
representation  of  Horus  transformed  to 
conquer  Typhon.  The  Sphinx  and  Edfu ! 
For  such  marvels  we  ought  to  bless  the 
hawk-headed  god.  And  if  we  forget  the 
hawk,  which  one  meets  so  perpetually 
upon  the  walls  of  tombs  and  temples,  and 
identify  Horus  rather  with  the  Greek 
Apollo,  the  yellow-haired  god  of  the  sun, 
driving  "  westerly  all  day  in  his  flaming 


202  KOM    OMBOS 

chariot,"  and  shooting  his  golden  arrows 
at  the  happy  world  beneath,  we  can  be  at 
peace  with  those  dead  Egyptians.  For 
every  pilgrim  who  goes  to  Edfu  to-day  is 
surely  a  worshipper  of  the  solar  aspect  of 
Horus.  As  long  as  the  world  lasts  there 
will  be  sun-worshippers.  Every  brown 
man  upon  the  Nile  is  one,  and  every  good 
American  who  crosses  the  ocean  and 
comes  at  last  into  the  sombre  wonder  of 
Edfu,  and  I  was  one  upon  the  deck  of  the 
Loulia. 

And  we  all  worship  as  yet  in  the  dark, 
as  in  the  exquisite  dark,  like  faith,  of  the 
Holy  of  Holies  of  Horus. 


PHIL.E 


XVI 


As  I  drew  slowly  nearer  and  nearer  to 
the  home  of  "  the  great  Enchantress,"  or, 
as  Isis  was  also  called  in  bygone  days, 
"  the  Lady  of  Philae,"  the  land  began  to 
change  in  character,  to  be  full  of  a  new 
and  barbaric  meaning.  In  recent  years 
I  have  paid  many  visits  to  northern  Af- 
rica, but  only  to  Tunisia  and  Algeria, 
countries  that  are  wilder  looking,  and 
much  wilder  seeming  than  Egypt.  Now, 
as  I  approached  Assuan,  I  seemed  at  last 
to  be  also  approaching  the  real,  the  in- 
tense Africa  that  I  had  known  in  the  Sa- 
hara, the  enigmatic  siren,  savage  and 
strange  and  wonderful,  whom  the  typical 
Ouled  Nail,  crowned  with  gold,  and  tufted 

with  ostrich  plumes,  painted  with  kohl, 
205 


206  PHILJE 

tattooed,  and  perfumed,  hung  with  golden 
coins  and  amulets,  and  framed  in  plaits 
of  coarse,  false  hair,  represents  indiffer- 
ently to  the  eyes  of  the  travelling 
stranger.  For  at  last  I  saw  the  sands  that 
I  love  creeping  down  to  the  banks  of  the 
Nile.  And  they  brought  with  them  that 
wonderful  air  which  belongs  only  to  them 
— the  air  that  dwells  among  the  dunes  in 
the  solitary  places,  that  is  like  the  cool 
touch  of  Liberty  upon  the  face  of  a  man, 
that  makes  the  brown  child  of  the  nomad 
as  lithe,  tireless,  and  fierce-spirited  as  a 
young  panther,  and  sets  flame  in  the  eyes 
of  the  Arab  horse,  and  gives  speed  of  the 
wind  to  the  Sloughi.  The  true  lover  of 
the  desert  can  never  rid  his  soul  of  its 
passion  for  the  sands,  and  now  my  heart 
leaped  as  I  stole  into  their  pure  embraces, 
as  I  saw  to  right  and  left  amber  curves 
and  sheeny  recesses,  shining  ridges  and 
bloomy  clefts.  The  clean  delicacy  of  those 
sands  that,  in  long  and  glowing  hills, 
stretched  out  from  Nubia  to  meet  me,  who 


PHIUE  207 

could  ever  describe  them?  Who  could 
ever  describe  their  soft  and  enticing 
shapes,  their  exquisite  gradations  of  col- 
our, the  little  shadows  in  their  hollows, 
the  fiery  beauty  of  their  crests,  the  pat- 
terns the  cool  winds  make  upon  them  ?  It 
is  an  enchanted  royaume  of  the  sands 
through  which  one  approaches  Isis. 

Isis  and  engineers!  We  English  peo- 
ple have  effected  that  curious  introduction, 
and  we  greatly  pride  ourselves  upon  it. 
We  have  presented  Sir  William  Garstin, 
and  Mr.  John  Blue,  and  Mr.  FitzMaurice, 
and  other  clever,  hard-working  men  to 
the  fabled  Lady  of  Philae,  and  they  have 
given  her  a  gift:  a  dam  two  thousand 
yards  in  length,  upon  which  tourists  go 
smiling  on  trolleys.  Isis  has  her  expen- 
sive tribute — it  cost  about  a  million  and 
a  half  pounds — and  no  doubt  she  ought 
to  be  gratified. 

Yet  I  think  Isis  mourns  on  altered 
Philae,  as  she  mourns  with  her  sister, 
Nepthys,  at  the  heads  of  so  many  mum- 


208  PHILvE 

mies  of  Osirians  upon  the  walls  of  Egyp- 
tian tombs.  And  though  the  fellaheen 
very  rightly  rejoice,  there  are  some  un- 
practical sentimentalists  who  form  a  com- 
pany about  her,  and  make  their  plaint 
with  hers — their  plaint  for  the  peace  that 
is  gone,  for  the  lost  calm,  the  departed 
poetry,  that  once  hung,  like  a  delicious, 
like  an  inimitable,  atmosphere,  about  the 
palms  of  the  "  Holy  Island." 

I  confess  that  I  dreaded  to  revisit 
Philae.  I  had  sweet  memories  of  the  island 
that  had  been  with  me  for  many  years — 
memories  of  still  mornings  under  the 
palm-trees,  watching  the  gliding  waters 
of  the  river,  or  gazing  across  them  to  the 
long  sweep  of  the  empty  sands ;  memories 
of  drowsy,  golden  noons,  when  the  bright 
world  seemed  softly  sleeping,  and  the  al- 
most daffodil-coloured  temple  dreamed 
under  the  quivering  canopy  of  blue ;  mem- 
ories of  evenings  when  a  benediction  from 
the  lifted  hands  of  Romance  surely  fell 
upon  the  temple  and  the  island  and  the 


PHILyE  209 

river;  memories  of  moonlit  nights,  when 
the  spirits  of  the  old  gods  to  whom  the 
temples  were  reared  surely  held  converse 
with  the  spirits  of  the  desert,  with  Mirage 
and  her  pale  and  evading  sisters  of  the 
great  spaces,  under  the  brilliant  stars.  I 
was  afraid,  because  I  could  not  believe 
the  asservations  of  certain  practical  per- 
sons, full  of  the  hard  and  almost  angry 
desire  of  "  Progress,"  that  no  harm  had 
been  done  by  the  creation  of  the  reservoir, 
but  that,  on  the  contrary,  it  had  benefited 
the  temple.  The  action  of  the  water  upon 
the  stone,  they  said  with  vehement  voices, 
instead  of  loosening  it  and  causing  it  to 
crumble  untimely  away,  had  tended  to  har- 
den and  consolidate  it.  Here  I  should 
like  to  lie,  but  I  resist  the  temptation. 
Monsieur  Naville  has  stated  that  possibly 
the  English  engineers  have  helped  to  pro- 
long the  lives  of  the  buildings  of  Philae, 
and  Monsieur  Maspero  has  declared  that 
"  the  state  of  the  temple  of  Philae  becomes 
continually  more  satisfactory."  So  be 


210  PHILyE 

it!  Longevity  has  been,  by  a  happy 
chance,  secured.  But  what  of  beauty? 
What  of  the  beauty  of  the  past,  and  what 
of  the  schemes  for  the  future?  Is  Philge 
even  to  be  left  as  it  is,  or  are  the  waters 
of  the  Nile  to  be  artificially  raised  still 
higher,  until  Philae  ceases  to  be?  Soon, 
no  doubt,  an  answer  will  be  given. 

Meanwhile,  instead  of  the  little  island 
that  I  knew,  and  thought  a  little  paradise 
breathing  out  enchantment  in  the  midst 
of  titanic  sterility,  I  found  a  something 
diseased.  Philae  now,  when  out  of  the 
water,  as  it  was  all  the  time  when  I  was 
last  in  Egypt,  looks  like  a  thing  stricken 
with  some  creeping  malady — one  of  those 
maladies  which  begin  in  the  lower  mem- 
bers of  a  body,  and  work  their  way  gradu- 
ally but  inexorably  upward  to  the  trunk, 
until  they  attain  the  heart. 

I  came  to  it  by  the  desert,  and  de- 
scended to  Shellal — Shellal  with  its  rail- 
way-station, its  workmen's  buildings,  its 
tents,  its  dozens  of  screens  to  protect  the 


PHILJE  211 

hewers  of  stone  from  the  burning  rays  of 
the  sun,  its  bustle  of  people,  of  overseers, 
engineers,  and  workmen,  Egyptian,  Nu- 
bian, Italian,  and  Greek.  The  silence  I 
had  known  was  gone,  though  the  desert 
lay  all  around — the  great  sands,  the  great 
masses  of  granite  that  look  as  if  patiently 
waiting  to  be  fashioned  into  obelisks,  and 
sarcophagi,  and  statues.  But  away  there 
across  the  bend  of  the  river,  dominating 
the  ugly  rummage  of  this  intrusive  bee- 
hive of  human  bees,  sheer  grace  overcom- 
ing strength  both  of  nature  and  human 
nature,  rose  the  fabled  "  Pharaoh's  Bed  " ; 
gracious,  tender,  from  Shellal  most  deli- 
cately perfect,  and  glowing  with  pale  gold 
against  the  grim  background  of  the  hills 
on  the  western  shore.  It  seemed  to  plead 
for  mercy,  like  something  feminine 
threatened  with  outrage,  to  protest 
through  its  mere  beauty,  as  a  woman 
might  protest  by  an  attitude,  against  fur- 
ther desecration. 

And  in  the  distance  the  Nile   roared 


212  PHIL^E 

through  the  many  gates  of  the  dam,  mak- 
ing answer  to  the  protest. 

What  irony  was  in  this  scene!  In  the 
old  days  of  Egypt  Philae  was  sacred 
ground,  was  the  Nile-protected  home  of 
sacerdotal  mysteries,  was  a  veritable 
Mecca  to  the  believers  in  Osiris,  to  which 
it  was  forbidden  even  to  draw  near  with- 
out permission.  The  ancient  Egyptians 
swore  solemnly  "  By  him  who  sleeps  in 
Philse."  Now  they  sometimes  sware  an- 
grily at  him  who  wakes  in,  or  at  least  by, 
Philae,  and  keeps  them  steadily  going  at 
their  appointed  tasks.  And  instead  of  it 
being  forbidden  to  draw  near  to  a  sacred 
spot,  needy  men  from  foreign  countries 
flock  thither  in  eager  crowds,  not  to  wor- 
ship in  beauty,  but  to  earn  a  living  wage. 

And  "  Pharaoh's  Bed  "  looks  out  over 
the  water  and  seems  to  wonder  what  will 
be  the  end. 

I  was  glad  to  escape  from  Shellal,  pur- 
sued by  the  shriek  of  an  engine  announc- 
ing its  departure  from  the  station,  glad 


PHIL.E  213 

to  be  on  the  quiet  water,  to  put  it  between 
me  and  that  crowd  of  busy  workers.  Be- 
fore me  I  saw  a  vast  lake,  not  unlovely, 
where  once  the  Nile  flowed  swiftly,  far 
off  a  grey  smudge — the  very  damnable 
dam.  All  around  me  was  a  grim  and  cruel 
world  of  rocks,  and  of  hills  that  look  al- 
most like  heaps  of  rubbish,  some  of  them 
grey,  some  of  them  in  colour  so  dark  that 
they  resemble  the  lava  torrents  petrified 
near  Catania,  or  the  "  Black  Country  "  in 
England  through  which  one  rushes  on 
one's  way  to  the  north.  Just  here  and 
there,  sweetly  almost  as  the  pink  blossoms 
of  the  wild  oleander,  which  I  have  seen 
from  Sicilian  seas  lifting  their  heads  from 
the  crevices  of  sea  rocks,  the  amber  and 
rosy  sands  of  Nubia  smiled  down  over 
grit,  stone,  and  granite. 

The  setting  of  Philae  is  severe.  Even 
in  bright  sunshine  it  has  an  iron  look.  On 
a  grey  or  stormy  day  it  would  be  forbid- 
ding or  even  terrible.  In  the  old  winters 
and  springs  one  loved  Philae  the  more  be- 


214  PHIL^E 

cause  of  the  contrast  of  its  setting  with 
its  own  lyrical  beauty,  its  curious  tender- 
ness of  charm — a  charm  in  which  the  isle 
itself  was  mingled  with  its  buildings. 
But  now,  and  before  my  boat  had  touched 
the  quay,  I  saw  that  the  island  must  be 
ignored — if  possible. 

The  water  with  which  it  is  entirely  cov- 
ered during  a  great  part  of  the  year  seems 
to  have  cast  a  blight  upon  it.  The  very 
few  palms  have  a  drooping  and  tragic  air. 
The  ground  has  a  gangrened  appearance, 
and  much  of  it  shows  a  crawling  mass 
of  unwholesome-looking  plants,  which 
seem  crouching  down  as  if  ashamed  of 
their  brutal  exposure  by  the  receded  river, 
and  of  harsh  and  yellow-green  grass,  un- 
attractive to  the  eyes.  As  I  stepped  on 
shore  I  felt  as  if  I  were  stepping  on  dis- 
ease. But  at  least  there  were  the  build- 
ings undisturbed  by  any  outrage.  Again 
I  turned  toward  "  Pharaoh's  Bed,"  toward 
the  temple  standing  apart  from  it,  which 
already  I  had  seen  from  the  desert,  near 


215 

Shellal,  gleaming  with  its  gracious  sand- 
yellow,  lifting  its  series  of  straight  lines 
of  masonry  above  the  river  and  the  rocks, 
looking,  from  a  distance,  very  simple,  with 
a  simplicity  like  that  of  clear  water,  but 
as  enticing  as  the  light  on  the  first  real 
day  of  spring. 

I  went  first  to  "  Pharaoh's  Bed." 
'Imagine  a  woman  with  a  perfectly 
lovely  face,  with  features  as  exquisitely 
proportioned  as  those,  say,  of  Praxiteles's 
statue  of  the  Cnidian  Aphrodite,  for 
which  King  Nicomedes  was  willing  to  re- 
mit the  entire  national  debt  of  Cnidus, 
and  with  a  warmly  white  rose-leaf  com- 
plexion— one  of  those  complexions  one 
sometimes  sees  in  Italian  women,  colour- 
less, yet  suggestive  almost  of  glow,  of 
purity,  with  the  flame  of  passion  behind 
it.  Imagine  that  woman  attacked  by  a 
malady  which  leaves  her  features  ex- 
actly as  they  were,  but  which  changes  the 
colour  of  her  face — from  the  throat  up- 
ward to  just  beneath  the  nose — from  the 


216  PHIL.E 

warm  white  to  a  mottled,  greyish  hue. 
Imagine  the  line  that  would  seem  to  be 
traced  between  the  two  complexions — 
the  mottled  grey  below  the  warm  white 
still  glowing  above.  Imagine  this,  and 
you  have  "  Pharaoh's  Bed  "  and  the  tem- 
ple of  Philae  as  they  are  to-day. 


PHARAOH'S  BED  " 


XVII 
"  PHARAOH'S  BED  " 

"  PHARAOH'S  BED,"  which  stands  alone 
close  to  the  Nile  on  the  eastern  side  of 
the  island,  is  not  one  of  those  rugged,  ma- 
jestic buildings,  full  of  grandeur  and 
splendour,  which  can  bear,  can  "  carry 
off,"  as  it  were,  a  cruelly  imposed  ugli- 
ness without  being  affected  as  a  whole. 
It  is,  on  the  contrary,  a  small,  almost  an 
airy,  and  a  femininely  perfect  thing,  in 
which  a  singular  loveliness  of  form  was 
combined  with  a  singular  loveliness  of 
colour.  The  spell  it  threw  over  you  was 
not  so  much  a  spell  woven  of  details  as  a 
spell  woven  of  divine  uniformity.  To  put 
it  in  very  practical  language,  "  Pharaoh's 
Bed  "  was  "  all  of  a  piece."  The  form 
was  married  to  the  colour.  The  colour 
219 


220  "PHARAOH'S    BED" 

seemed  to  melt  into  the  form.  It  was  in- 
deed a  bed  in  which  the  soul  that  worships 
beauty  could  rest  happily  entranced. 
Nothing  jarred.  Antiquaries  say  that  ap- 
parently this  building  was  left  unfinished. 
That  may  be  so.  But  for  all  that  it  was 
one  of  the  most  finished  things  in  Egypt, 
essentially  a  thing  to  inspire  within  one 
the  "perfect  calm  that  is  Greek."  The 
blighting  touch  of  the  Nile,  which  has 
changed  the  beautiful  pale  yellow  of  the 
stone  of  the  lower  part  of  the  building  to 
a  hideous  and  dreary  grey — which  made 
me  think  of  a  steel  knife  on  which  liquid 
has  been  spilt  and  allowed  to  run — has 
destroyed  the  uniformity,  the  balance,  the 
faultless  melody  lifted  up  by  form  and 
colour.  And  so  it  is  with  the  temple.  It 
is,  as  it  were,  cut  in  two  by  the  intrusion 
into  it  of  this  hideous,  mottled  complex- 
ion left  by  the  receded  water.  Every- 
where one  sees  disease  on  walls  and  col- 
umns, almost  blotting  out  bas-reliefs,  giv- 
ing to  their  active  figure*  a  morbid,  a 


"PHARAOH'S    BED"  221 

sickly  look.  The  effect  is  specially  dis- 
tressing in  the  open  court  that  precedes 
the  temple  dedicated  to  the  Lady  of  Philae. 
In  this  court,  which  is  at  the  southern  end 
of  the  island,  the  Nile  at  certain  seasons 
is  now  forced  to  rise  very  nearly  as  high 
as  the  capitals  of  many  of  the  columns. 
The  consequence  of  this  is  that  here  the 
disease  seems  making  rapid  strides.  One 
feels  it  is  drawing  near  to  the  heart,  and 
that  the  poor,  doomed  invalid  may  collapse 
at  any  moment. 

Yes,  there  is  much  to  make  one  sad 
at  Philae.  But  how  much  of  pure  beauty 
there  is  left — of  beauty  that  merely  pro- 
tests against  any  further  outrage ! 

As  there  is  something  epic  in  the  gran- 
deur of  the  Lotus  Hall  at  Karnak,  so 
there  is  something  lyrical  in  the  soft 
charm  of  the  Philse  temple.  Certain 
things  or  places,  certain  things  in  certain 
places,  always  suggest  to  my  mind  certain 
people  in  whose  genius  I  take  delight — 
who  have  won  me,  and  moved  me  by  their 


222  "PHARAOH'S    BED" 

art.  Whenever  I  go  to  Philae,  the  name 
of  Shelley  comes  to  me.  I  scarcely  could 
tell  why.  I  have  no  special  reason  to  con- 
nect Shelley  with  Philae.  But  when  I  see 
that  almost  airy  loveliness  of  stone,  so 
simply  elegant,  so,  somehow,  spring-like 
in  its  pale-coloured  beauty,  its  happy,  daf- 
fodil charm,  with  its  touch  of  the  Greek 
— the  sensitive  hand  from  Attica  stretched 
out  over  Nubia — I  always  think  of  Shel- 
ley. I  think  of  Shelley  the  youth  who 
dived  down  into  the  pool  so  deep  that  it 
seemed  he  was  lost  for  ever  to  the  sun. 
I  think  of  Shelley  the  poet,  full  of  a  lyric 
ecstasy,  who  was  himself  like  an  embodied 

"  Longing1  for  something  afar 
From  the  sphere  of  our  sorrow." 

Lyrical  Philae  is  like  a  temple  of  dreams, 
and  of  all  poets  Shelley  might  have 
dreamed  the  dream,  and  have  told  it  to 
the  world  in  a  song. 

For  all  its  solidity,  there  are  a  strange 
lightness    and   grace   in   the   temple    of 


"PHARAOH'S    BED"  223 

Philae;  there  is  an  elegance  you  will  not 
find  in  the  other  temples  of  Egypt.  But 
it  is  an  elegance  quite  undefiled  by  weak- 
ness, by  any  sentimentality.  (Even  a 
building,  like  a  love-lorn  maid,  can  be  sen- 
timental.) Edward  FitzGerald  once  de- 
fined taste  as  the  feminine  of  genius. 
Taste  prevails  in  Philae,  a  certain  delicious 
femininity  that  seduces  the  eyes  and  the 
heart  of  man.  Shall  we  call  it  the  spirit 
of  Isis? 

I  have  heard  a  clever  critic  and  anti- 
quarian declare  that  he  is  not  very  fond 
of  Philae ;  that  he  feels  a  certain  "  spu- 
riousness  "  in  the  temple  due  to  the  ming- 
ling of  Greek  with  Egyptian  influences. 
He  may  be  right.  I  am  no  antiquarian, 
and,  as  a  mere  lover  of  beauty,  I  do  not 
feel  this  "  spuriousness."  I  can  see 
neither  two  quarrelling  strengths  nor  any 
weakness  caused  by  division.  I  suppose  I 
see  only  the  beauty,  as  I  might  see  only 
the  beauty  of  a  woman  bred  of  a  hand- 
some father  and  mother  of  different  races, 


224  "PHARAOH'S    BED" 

and  who,  not  typical  of  either,  combined 
in  her  features  and  figure  distinguishing 
merits  of  both.  It  is  true  that  there  is  a 
particular  pleasure  which  is  roused  in  us 
only  by  the  absolutely  typical — the  com- 
pletely thoroughbred  person  or  thing.  It 
may  be  a  pleasure  not  caused  by  beauty, 
and  it  may  be  very  keen,  nevertheless. 
When  it  is  combined  with  the  joy  roused 
in  us  by  all  beauty,  it  is  a  very  pure  emo- 
tion of  exceptional  delight.  Philae  does 
not,  perhaps,  give  this  emotion.  But  it 
certainly  has  a  lovableness  that  attaches 
the  heart  in  a  quite  singular  degree.  The 
Philse-lover  is  the  most  faithful  of  lovers. 
The  hold  of  his  mistress  upon  him,  once 
it  has  been  felt,  is  never  relaxed.  And 
in  his  affection  for  Philse  there  is,  I  think, 
nearly  always  a  rainbow  strain  of  ro- 
mance. 

When  we  love  anything,  we  love  to  be 
able  to  say  of  the  object  of  our  devotion, 
"  There  is  nothing  like  it."  Now,  in  all 
Egypt,  and  I  suppose  in  all  the  world, 


"PHARAOH'S    BED"  225 

there  is  nothing  just  like  Philae.  There 
are  temples,  yes;  but  where  else  is  there 
a  bouquet  of  gracious  buildings  such  as 
these  gathered  in  such  a  holder  as  this 
tiny,  raft-like  isle?  And  where  else  are 
just  such  delicate  and,  as  I  have  said,  light 
and  almost  feminine  elegance  and  charm 
set  in  the  midst  of  such  severe  sterility? 
Once,  beyond  Philae,  the  Great  Cataract 
roared  down  from  the  wastes  of  Nubia 
into  the  green  fertility  of  Upper  Egypt. 
It  roars  no  longer.  But  still  the  masses 
of  the  rocks,  and  still  the  amber  and  the 
yellow  sands,  and  still  the  iron-coloured 
hills,  keep  guard  round  Philae.  And  still, 
despite  the  vulgar  desecration  that  has 
turned  Shellal  into  a  workmen's  suburb 
and  dowered  it  with  a  railway-station, 
there  is  mystery  in  Philae,  and  the  sense 
of  isolation  that  only  an  island  gives. 
Even  now  one  can  forget  in  Philae — for- 
get, after  a  while,  and  in  certain  parts 
of  its  buildings,  the  presence  of  the  grey 
disease;  forget  the  threatening  of  the  al- 


226  "PHARAOH'S    BED" 

truists,  who  desire  to  benefit  humanity  by 
clearing  as  much  beauty  out  of  humanity's 
abiding-place  as  possible;  forget  the  fact 
of  the  railway,  except  when  the  shriek 
of  the  engine  floats  over  the  water  to  one's 
ears;  forget  economic  problems,  and  the 
destruction  that  their  solving  brings  upon 
the  silent  world  of  things  whose  "  use," 
denied,  unrecognised,  or  laughed  at,  to 
man  is  in  their  holy  beauty,  whose  mis- 
sion lies  not  upon  the  broad  highways 
where  tramps  the  hungry  body,  but  upon 
the  secret,  shadowy  byways  where  glides 
the  hungry  soul. 

Yes,  one  can  forget  even  now  in  the  hall 
of  the  temple  of  Isis,  where  the  capri- 
cious graces  of  form  are  linked  with  the 
capricious  graces  of  colour,  where,  like 
old  and  delicious  music  in  the  golden 
strings  of  a  harp,  dwells  a  something — 
what  is  it?  A  murmur,  or  a  perfume,  or 
a  breathing? — of  old  and  vanished  years 
when  forsaken  gods  were  worshipped. 
And  one  can  forget  in  the  chapel  of  Ha- 


"PHARAOH'S    BED"  227 

thor,  on  whose  wall  little  Horus  is  born, 
and  in  the  grey  hounds'  chapel  beside  it. 
One  can  forget,  for  one  walks  in  beauty. 

Lovely  are  the  doorways  in  Philae,  en- 
ticing are  the  shallow  steps  that  lead  one 
onward  and  upward;  gracious  the  yellow 
towers  that  seem  to  smile  a  quiet  welcome. 
And  there  is  one  chamber  that  is  simply 
a  place  of  magic — the  hall  of  the  painted 
portico,  the  delicious  hall  of  the  flowers. 

It  is  this  chamber  which  always  makes 
me  think  of  Philse  as  a  lovely  temple  of 
dreams,  this  silent,  retired  chamber, 
where  some  fabled  princess  might  well 
have  been  touched  to  a  long,  long  sleep 
of  enchantment,  and  lain  for  years  upon 
years  among  the  magical  flowers — the  lo- 
tus, and  the  palm,  and  the  papyrus. 

In  my  youth  it  made  upon  me  an  in- 
delible impression.  Through  intervening 
years,  filled  with  many  new  impressions, 
many  wanderings,  many  visions  of  beauty 
in  other  lands,  that  retired,  painted  cham- 
ber had  not  faded  from  my  mind — or  shall 


228  "  PHARAOH'S    BED  " 

I  say  from  my  heart?  There  had  seemed 
to  me  within  it  something  that  was  in- 
effable, as  in  a  lyric  of  Shelley's  there  is 
something  that  is  ineffable,  or  in  certain 
pictures  of  Boecklin,  such  as  "  The  Villa 
by  the  Sea."  And  when  at  last,  almost 
afraid  and  hesitating,  I  came  into  it  once 
more,  I  found  in  it  again  the  strange  spell 
of  old  enchantment. 

It  seems  as  if  this  chamber  had  been 
imagined  by  a  poet,  who  had  set  it  in  the 
centre  of  the  temple  of  his  dream.  It  is 
such  a  spontaneous  chamber  that  one  can 
scarcely  imagine  it  more  than  a  day  and 
a  night  in  the  building.  Yet  in  detail  it  is 
lovely ;  it  is  finished  and  strangely  mighty ; 
it  is  a  lyric  in  stone,  the  most  poetical 
chamber,  perhaps,  in  the  whole  of  Egypt. 
For  Philae  I  count  in  Egypt,  though  really 
it  is  in  Nubia. 

One  who  has  not  seen  Philse  may  per- 
haps wonder  how  a  tall  chamber  of  solid 
stone,  containing  heavy  and  soaring  col- 
umns, can  be  like  a  lyric  of  Shelley's,  can 


"PHARAOH'S    BED"  229 

be  exquisitely  spontaneous,  and  yet  hold 
a  something  of  mystery  that  makes  one 
tread  softly  in  it,  and  fear  to  disturb 
within  it  some  lovely  sleeper  of  Nubia, 
some  Princess  of  the  Nile.  He  must  con- 
tinue to  wonder.  To  describe  this  cham- 
ber calmly,  as  I  might,  for  instance,  de- 
scribe the  temple  of  Derr,  would  be  simply 
to  destroy  it.  For  things  ineffable  can- 
not be  fully  explained,  or  not  be  fully  felt 
by  those  the  twilight  of  whose  dreams  is 
fitted  to  mingle  with  their  twilight.  They 
who  are  meant  to  love  with  ardour  se  pas- 
sionnent  pour  la  passion.  And  they  who 
are  meant  to  take  and  to  keep  the  spirit 
of  a  dream,  whether  it  be  hidden  in  a 
poem,  or  held  in  the  cup  of  a  flower,  or 
enfolded  in  arms  of  stone,  will  surely 
never  miss  it,  even  though  they  can  hear 
roaring  loudly  above  its  elfin  voice  the  cry 
of  directed  waters  rushing  down  to  Upper 
Egypt. 

How  can  one  disentangle  from  their 
tapestry  web  the  different  threads  of  a 


230  "PHARAOH'S    BED" 

spell?  And  even  if  one  could,  if  one 
could  hold  them  up,  and  explain,  "  The 
cause  of  the  spell  is  that  this  comes  in  con- 
tact with  this,  and  that  this,  which  I  show 
you,  blends  with,  fades  into,  this,"  how 
could  it  advantage  any  one?  Nothing 
would  be  made  clearer,  nothing  be  really 
explained.  The  ineffable  is,  and  must  ever 
remain,  something  remote  and  mysterious. 
And  so  one  may  say  many  things  of 
this  painted  chamber  of  Philse,  and  yet 
never  convey,  perhaps  never  really  know, 
the  innermost  cause  of  its  charm.  In  it 
there  is  obvious  beauty  of  form,  and  a 
seizing  beauty  of  colour,  beauty  of  sun- 
light and  shadow,  of  antique  association. 
This  turquoise  blue  is  enchanting,  and 
Isis  was  worshipped  here.  What  has  the 
one  to  do  with  the  other?  Nothing;  and 
yet  how  much!  For  is  not  each  of  these 
facts  a  thread  in  the  tapestry  web  of  the 
spell?  The  eyes  see  the  rapture  of  this 
very  perfect  blue.  The  imagination  hears, 
as  if  very  far  off,  the  solemn  chanting  of 


"PHARAOH'S    BED"  231 

priests,  and  smells  the  smoke  of  strange 
perfumes,  and  sees  the  long,  aquiline  nose 
and  the  thin,  haughty  lips  of  the  goddess. 
And  the  colour  becomes  strange  to  the 
eyes,  as  well  as  very  lovely,  because,  per- 
haps, it  was  there — it  almost  certainly 
was  there — when  from  Constantinople 
went  forth  the  decree  that  all  Egypt 
should  be  Christian;  when  the  priests  of 
the  sacred  brotherhood  of  Isis  were  driven 
from  their  temple. 

Isis  nursing  Horus  gave  way  to  the 
Virgin  and  the  Child.  But  the  cycles  spin 
away  down  "  the  ringing  grooves  of 
change."  From  Egypt  has  passed  away 
that  decreed  Christianity.  Now  from  the 
minaret  the  muezzin  cries,  and  in  palm- 
shaded  villages  I  hear  the  loud  hymns 
of  earnest  pilgrims  starting  on  the  jour- 
ney to  Mecca.  And  ever  this  painted 
chamber  shelters  its  mystery  of  poetry, 
its  mystery  of  charm.  And  still  its  mar- 
vellous colours  are  fresh  as  in  the  far-off 
pagan  days,  and  the  opening  lotus-flow- 


232  "PHARAOH'S    BED" 

ers,  and  the  closed  lotus-buds,  and  the 
palm  and  the  papyrus,  are  on  the  per- 
fect columns.  And  their  intrinsic  loveli- 
ness, and  their  freshness,  and  their  age, 
and  the  mysteries  they  have  looked  on — 
all  these  facts  are  part  of  the  spell  that 
governs  us  to-day.  In  Edfu  one  is  en- 
closed in  a  wonderful  austerity.  And  one 
can  only  worship.  In  Philae  one  is 
wrapped  in  a  radiance  of  colour.  And 
one  can  only  dream.  For  there  is  coral- 
pink,  and  there  a  wonderful  green,  "like 
the  green  light  that  lingers  in  the  west," 
and  there  is  a  blue  as  deep  as  the  blue  of 
a  tropical  sea;  and  there  are  green-blue 
and  lustrous,  ardent  red.  And  the  odd 
fantasy  in  the  colouring,  is  not  that  like 
the  fantasy  in  the  temple  of  a  dream  ?  For 
those  who  painted  these  capitals  for  the 
greater  glory  of  Isis  did  not  fear  to  de- 
part from  nature,  and  to  their  patient  wor- 
ship a  blue  palm  perhaps  seemed  a  rarely 
sacred  thing.  And  that  palm  is  part  of 
the  spell,  and  the  reliefs  upon  the  walls, 


"PHARAOH'S    BED"  233 

and  even  the  Coptic  crosses  that  are  cut 
into  the  stone. 

But  at  the  end,  one  can  only  say  that 
this  place  is  indescribable,  and  not  because 
it  is  complex  or  terrifically  grand,  like 
Karnak.  Go  to  it  on  a  sunlit  morning, 
or  stand  in  it  in  late  afternoon,  and  per- 
haps you  will  feel  that  it  "  suggests  "  you, 
that  it  carries  you  away,  out  of  familiar 
regions  into  a  land  of  dreams,  where 
among  hidden  ways  the  soul  is  lost  in 
magic.  Yes,  you  are  gone. 

To  the  right — for  one,  alas !  cannot  live 
in  a  dream  for  ever — is  a  lovely  doorway 
through  which  one  sees  the  river.  Facing 
it  is  another  doorway,  showing  a  frag- 
ment of  the  poor,  vivisected  island,  some 
ruined  walls,  and  still  another  doorway 
in  which,  again,  is  framed  the  Nile. 
Many  people  have  cut  their  names  upon 
the  walls  of  Philse.  Once,  as  I  sat  alone 
there,  I  felt  strongly  attracted  to  look  up- 
ward to  a  wall,  as  if  some  personality,  en- 
shrined within  the  stone,  were  watching 


234  "PHARAOH'S    BED" 

me,  or  calling.    I  looked,  and  saw  written 
"  Balzac." 

Philae  is  the  last  temple  that  one  visits 
before  he  gives  himself  to  the  wildness 
of  the  solitudes  of  Nubia.  It  stands  at 
the  very  frontier.  As  one  goes  up  the 
Nile,  it  is  like  a  smiling  adieu  from  the 
Egypt  one  is  leaving.  As  one  comes  down, 
it  is  like  a  smiling  welcome.  In  its  deli- 
cate charm  I  feel  something  of  the  charm 
of  the  Egyptian  character.  There  are 
moments,  indeed,  when  I  identify  Egypt 
with  Philae.  For  in  Philse  one  must 
dream;  and  on  the  Nile,  too,  one  must 
dream.  And  always  the  dream  is  happy, 
and  shot  through  with  radiant  light — 
light  that  is  as  radiant  as  the  colours  in 
Philae's  temple.  The  pylons  of  Ptolemy 
smile  at  you  as  you  go  up  or  come  down 
the  river.  And  the  people  of  Egypt  smile 
as  they  enter  into  your  dream.  A  suavity, 
too,  is  theirs.  I  think  of  them  often  as 
artists,  who  know  their  parts  in  the 
dream-play,  who  know  exactly  their  func- 


"PHARAOH'S    BED"  235 

tion,  and  how  to  fulfil  it  rightly.  They 
sing,  while  you  are  dreaming,  but  it  is  an 
under-song,  like  the  murmur  of  an  East- 
ern river  far  off  from  any  sea.  It  never 
disturbs,  this  music,  but  it  helps  you  in 
your  dream.  And  they  are  softly  gay. 
And  in  their  eyes  there  is  often  the  gleam 
of  sunshine,  for  they  are  the  children — 
but  not  grown  men — of  the  sun.  That, 
indeed,  is  one  of  the  many  strange  things 
in  Egypt — the  youth  fulness  of  its  age, 
the  childlikeness  of  its  almost  terrible  an- 
tiquity. One  goes  there  to  look  at  the  old- 
est things  in  the  world  and  to  feel  perpet- 
ually young — young  as  Philse  is  young, 
as  a  lyric  of  Shelley's  is  young,  as  all  of 
our  day-dreams  are  young,  as  the  peo- 
ple of  Egypt  are  young. 

Oh,  that  Egypt  could  be  kept  as  it  is, 
even  as  it  is  now ;  that  Philae  could  be  pre- 
served even  as  it  is  now!  The  spoilers 
are  there,  those  blithe  modern  spirits,  so 
frightfully  clever  and  capable,  so  indus- 
trious, so  determined,  so  unsparing  of 


236  "PHARAOH'S   BED" 

themselves  and — of  others !  Already  they 
are  at  work  "benefiting  Egypt."  Tall 
chimneys  begin  to  vomit  smoke  along  the 
Nile.  A  damnable  tram-line  for  little 
trolleys  leads  one  toward  the  wonderful 
Colossi  of  Memnon.  Close  to  Kom  Om- 
bos  some  soul  imbued  with  romance  has 
had  the  inspiration  to  set  up — a  factory! 
And  Philae — is  it  to  go? 

Is  beauty  then  of  no  value  in  the 
world?  Is  it  always  to  be  the  prey  of 
modern  progress?  Is  nothing  to  be  con- 
sidered sacred;  nothing  to  be  left  un- 
touched, unsmirched  by  the  grimy  fin- 
gers of  improvement?  I  suppose  noth- 
ing. 

Then  let  those  who  still  care  to  dream 
go  now  to  Philae's  painted  chamber  by  the 
long  reaches  of  the  Nile;  go  on,  if  they 
will,  to  the  giant  forms  of  Abu-Simbel 
among  the  Nubian  sands.  And  perhaps 
they  will  think  with  me,  that  in  some 
dreams  there  is  a  value  greater  than  the 
value  that  is  entered  in  any  bank-book, 


"PHARAOH'S    BED"  237 

and  they  will  say,  with  me,  however  use- 
lessly : 

"  Leave  to  the  world  some  dreams,  some 
places  in  which  to  dream;  for  if  it  needs 
dams  to  make  the  grain  grow  in  the 
stretches  of  land  that  were  barren,  and 
railways  and  tram-lines,  and  factory 
chimneys  that  vomit  black  smoke  in  the 
face  of  the  sun,  surely  it  needs  also 
painted  chambers  of  Philae  and  the  silence 
that  comes  down  from  Isis." 


OLD  CAIRO 


XVIII 
OLD  CAIRO 

BY  Old  Cairo  I  do  not  mean  only  le  vieux 
Caire  of  the  guide-book,  the  little,  deso- 
late village  containing  the  famous  Coptic 
church  of  Abu  Sergius,  in  the  crypt  of 
which  the  Virgin  Mary  and  Christ  are 
said  to  have  stayed  when  they  fled  to  the 
land  of  Egypt  to  escape  the  fury  of  King 
Herod ;  but  the  Cairo  that  is  not  new,  that 
is  not  dedicated  wholly  to  officialdom  and 
tourists,  that,  in  the  midst  of  changes  and 
the  advance  of  civilisation — civilisation 
that  does  so  much  harm  as  well  as  so  much 
good,  that  showers  benefits  with  one  hand 
and  defaces  beauty  with  the  other — pre- 
serves its  immemorial  calm  or  immemor- 
ial tumult;  that  stands  aloof,  as  stands 
aloof  ever  the  Eastern  from  the  Western 
241 


242  OLD    CAIRO 

man,  even  in  the  midst  of  what  seems, 
perhaps,  like  intimacy;  Eastern  to  the 
soul,  though  the  fantasies,  the  passions, 
the  vulgarities,  the  brilliant  ineptitudes  of 
the  West  beat  about  it  like  waves  about 
some  unyielding  wall  of  the  sea. 

When  I  went  back  to  Egypt,  after  a 
lapse  of  many  years,  I  fled  at  once  from 
Cairo,  and  upon  the  long  reaches  of  the 
Nile,  in  the  great  spaces  of  the  Libyan 
Desert,  in  the  luxuriant  palm-grooves  of 
the  Fayyum,  among  the  tamarisk-bushes 
and  on  the  pale  waters  of  Kurun,  I  forgot 
the  changes  which,  in  my  brief  glimpse 
of  the  city  and  its  environs,  had  moved 
me  to  despondency.  But  one  cannot  live 
in  the  solitudes  for  ever.  And  at  last 
from  Madi-nat-al-Fayyum,  with  the  first 
pilgrims  starting  for  Mecca,  I  returned 
to  the  great  city,  determined  to  seek  in  it 
once  more  for  the  fascinations  it  used  to 
hold,  and  perhaps  still  held  in  the  hidden 
ways  where  modern  feet,  nearly  always 
in  a  hurry,  had  seldom  time  to  penetrate. 


OLD    CAIRO  243 

A  mist  hung  over  the  land.  Out  of  it, 
with  a  sort  of  stern  energy,  there  came  to 
my  ears  loud  hymns  sung  by  the  pilgrim 
voices — hymns  in  which,  mingled  with  the 
enthusiasm  of  devotees  en  route  for  the 
holiest  shrine  of  their  faith,  there  seemed 
to  sound  the  resolution  of  men  strung 
up  to  confront  the  fatigues  and  the  dan- 
gers of  a  great  journey  through  a  wild 
and  unknown  country.  Those  hymns  led 
my  feet  to  the  venerable  mosques  of 
Cairo,  the  city  of  mosques,  guided  me  on 
my  lesser  pilgrimage  among  the  cupolas 
and  the  colonnades,  where  grave  men 
dream  in  the  silence  near  marble  foun- 
tains, or  bend  muttering  their  prayers  be- 
neath domes  that  are  dimmed  by  the  ruth- 
less fingers  of  Time.  In  the  buildings 
consecrated  to  prayer  and  to  meditation 
I  first  sought  for  the  magic  that  still  lurks 
in  the  teeming  bosom  of  Cairo. 

Long  as  I  had  sought  it  elsewhere,  in 
the  brilliant  bazaars  by  day,  and  by  night 
in  the  winding  alleys,  where  the  dark- 


244  OLD    CAIRO 

eyed  Jews  looked  stealthily  forth  from  the 
low-browed  doorways;  where  the  Circas- 
sian girls  promenade,  gleaming  with 
golden  coins  and  barbaric  jewels;  where 
the  air  is  alive  with  music  that  is  feverish 
and  antique,  and  in  strangely  lighted  in- 
teriors one  sees  forms  clad  in  brilliant 
draperies,  or  severely  draped  in  the  sim- 
plest pale-blue  garments,  moving  in  lan- 
guid dances,  fluttering  painted  figures, 
bending,  swaying,  dropping  down,  like  the 
forms  that  people  a  dream. 

In  the  bazaars  is  the  passion  for  gain, 
in  the  alleys  of  music  and  light  is  the  pas- 
sion for  pleasure,  in  the  mosques  is  the 
passion  for  prayer  that  connects  the  souls 
of  men  with  the  unseen  but  strongly  felt 
world.  Each  of  these  passions  is  old,  each 
of  these  passions  in  the  heart  of  Islam  is 
fierce.  On  my  return  to  Cairo  I  sought 
for  the  hidden  fire  that  is  magic  in  the 
dusky  places  of  prayer. 

A  mist  lay  over  the  city  as  I  stood  in 
a  narrow  byway,  and  gazed  up  at  a  heavy 


OLD   CAIRO  245 

lattice,  of  which  the  decayed  and  black- 
ened wood  seemed  on  guard  before  some 
tragic  or  weary  secret.  Before  me  was 
the  entrance  to  the  mosque  of  Ibn-Tulun, 
older  than  any  mosque  in  Cairo  save  only 
the  mosque  of  Amru.  It  is  approached 
by  a  flight  of  steps,  on  each  side  of  which 
stand  old,  impenetrable  houses.  Above 
my  head,  strung  across  from  one  house  to 
the  other,  were  many  little  red  and  yel- 
low flags  ornamented  with  gold  lozenges. 
These  were  to  bear  witness  that  in  a 
couple  of  days'  time,  from  the  great  open 
place  beneath  the  citadel  of  Cairo,  the 
Sacred  Carpet  was  to  set  out  on  its  long 
journey  to  Mecca.  My  guide  struck  on 
a  door  and  uttered  a  fierce  cry.  A  small 
shutter  in  the  blackened  lattice  was 
opened,  and  a  young  girl,  with  kohl- 
tinted  eyelids,  and  a  brilliant  yellow  hand- 
kerchief tied  over  her  coarse  black  hair, 
leaned  out,  held  a  short  parley,  and  van- 
ished, drawing  the  shutter  to  behind  her. 
The  mist  crept  about  the  tawdry  flags,  a 


246  OLD    CAIRO 

heavy  door  creaked,  whined  on  its  hinges, 
and  from  the  house  of  the  girl  there  came 
an  old,  fat  man  bearing  a  mighty  key.  In 
a  moment  I  was  free  of  the  mosque  of 
Ibn-Tulun. 

I  ascended  the  steps,  passed  through  a 
doorway,  and  found  myself  on  a  piece  of 
waste  ground,  flanked  on  the  right  by  an 
old,  mysterious  wall,  and  on  the  left  by 
the  long  wall  of  the  mosque,  from  which 
close  to  me  rose  a  grey,  unornamented 
minaret,  full  of  the  plain  dignity  of  unpre- 
tending age.  Upon  its  summit  was 
perched  a  large  and  weary-looking  bird 
with  draggled  feathers,  which  remained 
so  still  that  it  seemed  to  be  a  sad  orna- 
ment set  there  above  the  city,  and  watch- 
ing it  for  ever  with  eyes  that  could  not 
see.  At  right  angles,  touching  the 
mosque,  was  such  a  house  as  one  can  see 
only  in  the  East — fantastically  old,  fan- 
tastically decayed,  bleared,  discoloured, 
filthy,  melancholy,  showing  hideous  win- 
dows, like  windows  in  the  slum  of  a  town 


OLD    CAIRO  247 

set  above  coal-pits  in  a  colliery  district,  a 
degraded  house,  and  yet  a  house  which 
roused  the  imagination  and  drove  it  to  its 
work.  In  this  building  once  dwelt  the 
High  Priest  of  the  mosque.  This  dwell- 
ing, the  ancient  wall,  the  grey  minaret 
with  its  motionless  bird,  the  lamentable 
waste  ground  at  my  feet,  prepared  me 
rightly  to  appreciate  the  bit  of  old  Cairo 
I  had  come  to  see. 

People  who  are  bored  by  Gothic 
churches  would  not  love  the  mosque  of 
Ibn-Tulun.  No  longer  is  it  used  for  wor- 
ship. It  contains  no  praying  life.  Aban- 
doned, bare,  and  devoid  of  all  lovely  orna- 
ment, it  stands  like  some  hoary  patriarch, 
naked  and  calm,  waiting  its  destined  end 
without  impatience  and  without  fear.  It 
is  a  fatalistic  mosque,  and  is  impressive, 
like  a  fatalistic  man.  The  great  court  of 
it,  three  hundred  feet  square,  with  pointed 
arches  supported  by  piers,  double,  and  on 
the  side  looking  toward  Mecca  quintuple 
arcades,  has  a  great  dignity  of  sombre 


248  OLD    CAIRO 

simplicity.  Not  grace,  not  a  light  ele- 
gance of  soaring  beauty,  but  massiveness 
and  heavy  strength  are  the  distinguish- 
ing features  of  this  mosque.  Even  the  oc- 
tagonal basin  and  its  protecting  cupola 
that  stand  in  the  middle  of  the  court 
lack  the  charm  that  belongs  to  so  many  of 
the  fountains  of  Cairo.  There  are  two 
minarets,  the  minaret  of  the  bird,  and  a 
larger  one,  approached  by  a  big  stairway 
up  wrhich,  so  my  dragoman  told  me,  a  Sul- 
tan whose  name  I  have  forgotten  loved 
to  ride  his  favourite  horse.  Upon  the 
summit  of  this  minaret  I  stood  for  a  long 
time,  looking  down  over  the  city. 

Grey  it  was  that  morning,  almost  as 
London  is  grey ;  but  the  sounds  that  came 
up  softly  to  my  ears  out  of  the  mist  were 
not  the  sounds  of  London.  Those  many 
minarets,  almost  like  columns  of  fog  ris- 
ing above  the  cupolas,  spoke  to  me  of  the 
East  even  upon  this  sad  and  sunless  morn- 
ing. Once  from  where  I  was  standing  at 
the  time  appointed  went  forth  the  call  to 


OLD    CAIRO  249 

prayer,  and  in  the  barren  court  beneath 
me  there  were  crowds  of  ardent  worship- 
pers. Stern  men  paced  upon  the  huge  ter- 
race just  at  my  feet  fingering  their  beads, 
and  under  that  heavy  cupola  were  made 
the  long  ablutions  of  the  faithful.  But 
now  no  man  comes  to  this  old  place,  no 
murmur  to  God  disturbs  the  heavy  silence. 
And  the  silence,  and  the  emptiness,  and 
the  greyness  under  the  long  arcades,  all 
seem  to  make  a  tremulous  proclamation; 
all  seem  to  whisper,  "  I  am  very  old,  I 
am  useless,  I  cumber  the  earth."  Even 
the  mosque  of  Amru,  which  stands  also 
on  ground  that  looks  gone  to  waste,  near 
dingy  and  squat  houses  built  with  grey 
bricks,  seems  less  old  than  this  mosque  of 
Ibn-Tulun.  For  its  long  fagade  is  striped 
with  white  and  apricot,  and  there  are  leb- 
bek-trees  growing  in  its  court  near  the 
two  columns  between  which  if  you  can 
pass  you  are  assured  of  heaven.  But  the 
mosque  of  Ibn-Tulun,  seen  upon  a  sad 
day,  makes  a  powerful  impression,  and 


250  OLD    CAIRO 

from  the  summit  of  its  minaret  you  are 
summoned  by  the  many  minarets  of  Cairo 
to  make  the  pilgrimage  of  the  mosques, 
to  pass  from  the  "  broken  arches "  of 
these  Saracenic  cloisters  to  the  "  Blue 
Mosque/'  the  "  Red  Mosque,"  the  mosques 
of  Mohammed  Ali,  of  Sultan  Hassan,  of 
Kait  Bey,  of  El-Azhar,  and  so  on  to  the 
Coptic  church  that  is  the  silent  centre  of 
"  old  Cairo/'  It  is  said  that  there  are 
over  four  hundred  mosques  in  Cairo.  As 
I  looked  down  from  the  minaret  of  Ibn- 
Tulun,  they  called  me  through  the  mist 
that  blotted  completely  out  all  the  sur- 
rounding country,  as  if  it  would  concen- 
trate my  attention  upon  the  places  of 
prayer  during  these  holy  days  when  the 
pilgrims  were  crowding  in  to  depart  with 
the  Holy  Carpet.  And  I  went  down  by 
the  staircase  of  the  house,  and  in  the  mist 
I  made  my  pilgrimage. 

As  every  one  who  visits  Rome  goes  to 
St.  Peter's,  so  every  one  who  visits  Cairo 
goes  to  the  mosque  of  Mohammed  Ali  in 


OLD    CAIRO  251 

the  citadel,  a  gorgeous  building  in  a  mag- 
nificent situation,  the  interior  of  which 
always  makes  me  think  of  Court  func- 
tions, and  of  the  pomp  of  life,  rather  than 
of  prayer  and  self-denial.  More  attrac- 
tive to  me  is  the  "  Blue  Mosque,"  to  which 
I  returned  again  and  again,  enticed  almost 
as  by  the  fascination  of  the  living  blue  of 
a  summer  sky. 

This  mosque,  which  is  the  mosque  of 
Ibrahim  Aga,  but  which  is  familiarly 
known  to  its  lovers  as  the  "  Blue  Mosque," 
lies  to  the  left  of  a  ramshackle  street,  and 
from  the  outside  does  not  look  specially 
inviting.  Even  when  I  passed  through 
its  door,  and  stood  in  the  court  beyond, 
at  first  I  felt  not  its  charm.  All  looked 
old  and  rough,  unkempt  and  in  confusion. 
The  red  and  white  stripes  of  the  walls 
and  the  arches  of  the  arcade,  the  mean 
little  place  for  ablution — a  pipe  and  a  row 
of  brass  taps — led  the  mind  from  a  Nea- 
politan ice  to  a  second-rate  school,  and 
for  a  moment  I  thought  of  abruptly  re- 


252  OLD    CAIRO 

tiring  and  seeking  more  splendid  pre- 
cincts. And  then  I  looked  across  the  court 
to  the  arcade  that  lay  beyond,  and  I  saw 
the  exquisite  "  love-colour  "  of  the  mar- 
vellous tiles  that  gives  this  mosque  its 
name. 

The  huge  pillars  of  this  arcade  are 
striped  and  ugly,  but  between  them  shone, 
with  an  ineffable  lustre,  a  wall  of  purple 
and  blue,  of  purple  and  blue  so  strong 
and  yet  so  delicate  that  it  held  the  eyes 
and  drew  the  body  forward.  If  ever  col- 
our calls,  it  calls  in  the  blue  mosque  of 
Ibrahim  Aga.  And  when  I  had  crossed 
the  court,  when  I  stood  beside  the  pulpit, 
with  its  delicious,  wooden  folding-doors, 
and  studied  the  tiles  of  which  this  won- 
derful wall  is  composed,  I  found  them  as 
lovely  near  as  they  are  lovely  far  off. 
From  a  distance  they  resemble  a  Nature 
effect,  are  almost  like  a  bit  of  Southern 
sea  or  of  sky,  a  fragment  of  gleaming 
Mediterranean  seen  through  the  pillars 
of  a  loggia,  or  of  Sicilian  blue  watching 


OLD    CAIRO  253 

over  Etna  in  the  long  summer  days. 
When  one  is  close  to  them,  they  are  a  mir- 
acle of  art.  The  background  of  them  is 
a  milky  white  upon  which  is  an  elaborate 
pattern  of  purple  and  blue,  generally  con- 
ventional and  representative  of  no  known 
object,  but  occasionally  showing  tall  trees 
somewhat  resembling  cypresses.  But  it  is 
impossible  in  words  adequately  to  describe 
the  effect  of  these  tiles,  and  of  the  tiles 
that  line  to  the  very  roof  the  tomb-house 
on  the  right  of  the  court.  They  are  like 
a  cry  of  ecstasy  going  up  in  this  otherwise 
not  very  beautiful  mosque;  they  make  it 
unforgetable,  they  draw  you  back  to  it 
again  and  yet  again.  On  the  darkest  day 
of  winter  they  set  something  of  summer 
there.  In  the  saddest  moment  they  pro- 
claim the  fact  that  there  is  joy  in  the 
world,  that  there  was  joy  in  the  hearts  of 
creative  artists  years  upon  years  ago.  If 
you  are  ever  in  Cairo,  and  sink  into  de- 
pression, go  to  the  "  Blue  Mosque  "  and 
see  if  it  does  not  have  upon  you  an  uplift- 


254  OLD    CAIRO 

ing  moral  effect.  And  then,  if  you  like, 
go  on  from  it  to  the  Gamia  El  Movayad, 
sometimes  called  El  Ahmar,  "  The  Red," 
where  you  will  find  greater  glories,  though 
no  greater  fascination;  for  the  tiles 
hold  their  own  among  all  the  wonders  of 
Cairo. 

Outside  the  "  Red  Mosque,"  by  its  im- 
posing and  lofty  wall,  there  is  always  an 
assemblage  of  people,  for  prayers  go  up 
in  this  mosque,  ablutions  are  made  there, 
and  the  floor  of  the  arcade  is  often  covered 
with  men  studying  the  Koran,  calmly 
meditating,  or  prostrating  themselves  in 
prayer.  And  so  there  is  a  great  coming 
and  going  up  the  outside  stairs  and 
through  the  wonderful  doorway :  beggars 
crouch  under  the  wall  of  the  terrace;  the 
sellers  of  cakes,  of  syrups  and  lemon- 
water,  and  of  the  big  and  luscious  water- 
melons that  are  so  popular  in  Cairo,  dis- 
play their  wares  beneath  awnings  of 
orange-coloured  sackcloth,  or  in  the  full 
glare  of  the  sun,  and,  their  prayers  com- 


OLD    CAIRO  255 

fortably  completed  or  perhaps  not  yet  be- 
gun, the  worshippers  stand  to  gossip,  or 
sit  to  smoke  their  pipes,  before  going  on 
their  way  into  the  city  or  the  mosque. 
There  are  noise  and  perpetual  movement 
here.  Stand  for  a  while  to  gain  an  im- 
pression from  them  before  you  mount  the 
steps  and  pass  into  the  spacious  peace  be- 
yond. 

Orientals  must  surely  revel  in  contrasts. 
There  is  no  tumult  like  the  tumult  in  cer- 
tain of  their  market-places.  There  is  no 
peace  like  the  peace  in  certain  of  their 
mosques.  Even  without  the  slippers  care- 
fully tied  over  your  boots  you  would  walk 
softly,  gingerly,  in  the  mosque  of  El  Mo- 
vayad,  the  mosque  of  the  columns  and  the 
garden.  For  once  within  the  door  you 
have  taken  wings  and  flown  from  the  city, 
you  are  in  a  haven  where  the  most 
delicious  calm  seems  floating  like  an 
atmosphere.  Through  a  lofty  colonnade 
you  come  into  the  mosque,  and  find  your- 
self beneath  a  magnificently  ornamental 


256  OLD    CAIRO 

wooden  roof,  the  general  effect  of  which 
is  of  deep  brown  and  gold,  though  there 
are  deftly  introduced  many  touches  of 
very  fine  red  and  strong,  luminous  blue. 
The  walls  are  covered  with  gold  and  su- 
perb marbles,  and  there  are  many  quota- 
tions from  the  Koran  in  Arab  lettering 
heavy  with  gold.  The  great  doors  are  of 
chiselled  bronze  and  of  wood.  In  the  dis- 
tance is  a  sultan's  tomb,  surmounted  by 
a  high  and  beautiful  cupola,  and  pierced 
with  windows  of  jewelled  glass.  But  the 
attraction  of  this  place  of  prayer  comes 
less  from  its  magnificence,  from  the  shin- 
ing of  its  gold,  and  the  gleaming  of  its 
many-coloured  marbles,  than  from  its  spa- 
ciousness, its  airiness,  its  still  seclusion, 
and  its  garden.  Mohammedans  love  foun- 
tains and  shady  places,  as  can  surely  love 
them  only  those  who  carry  in  their  minds 
a  remembrance  of  the  desert.  They  love  to 
have  flowers  blowing  beside  them  while 
they  pray.  And  with  the  immensely  high 
and  crenelated  wall's  of  this  mosque  long 


OLD    CAIRO  257 

ago  they  set  a  fountain  of  pure  white  mar- 
ble, covered  it  with  a  shelter  of  limestone, 
and  planted  trees  and  flowers  about  it. 
There  beneath  palms  and  tall  eucalyptus- 
trees  even  on  this  misty  day  of  the 
winter,  roses  were  blooming,  pinks  scented 
the  air,  and  great  red  flowers,  that  looked 
like  emblems  of  passion,  stared  upward 
almost  fiercely,  as  if  searching  for  the 
sun.  As  I  stood  there  among  the  wor- 
shippers in  the  wide  colonnade,  near  the 
exquisitely  carved  pulpit  in  the  shadow 
of  which  an  old  man  who  looked  like 
Abraham  was  swaying  to  and  fro  and 
whispering  his  prayers,  I  thought  of 
Omar  Khayyam  and  how  he  would  have 
loved  this  garden.  But  instead  of  water 
from  the  white  marble  fountain,  he  would 
have  desired  a  cup  of  wine  to  drink  be- 
neath the  boughs  of  the  sheltering  trees. 
And  he  could  not  have  joined  without 
doubt  or  fear  in  the  fervent  devotions  of 
the  undoubting  men,  who  came  here  to 
steep  their  wills  in  the  great  will  that 


258  OLD    CAIRO 

flowed  about  them  like  the  ocean  about 
little  islets  of  the  sea. 

From  the  "  Red  Mosque  "  I  went  to  the 
great  mosque  of  El-Azhar,  to  the  wonder- 
ful mosque  of  Sultan  Hassan,  which  un- 
fortunately was  being  repaired  and  could 
not  be  properly  seen,  though  the  examina- 
tion of  the  old  portal  covered  with  silver, 
gold,  and  brass,  the  general  colour-effect 
of  which  is  a  delicious  dull  green,  repaid 
me  for  my  visit,  and  to  the  exquisitely 
graceful  tomb-mosque  of  Kait  Bey,  which 
is  beyond  the  city  walls.  But  though  I 
visited  these,  and  many  other  mosques 
and  tombs,  including  the  tombs  of  the 
Khalifas,  and  the  extremely  smart  mod- 
ern tombs  of  the  family  of  the  present 
Khedive  of  Egypt,  no  building  dedicated 
to  worship,  or  to  the  cult  of  the  dead,  left 
a  more  lasting  impression  upon  my  mind 
than  the  Coptic  church  of  Abu  Sergius, 
or  Abu  Sargah,  which  stands  in  the  deso- 
late and  strangely  antique  quarter  called 
"Old  Cairo."  Old  indeed  it  seems,  al- 


OLD    CAIRO  259 

most  terribly  old.  Silent  and  desolate  is 
it,  untouched  by  the  vivid  life  of  the  rich 
and  prosperous  Egypt  of  to-day,  a  place 
of  sad  dreams,  a  place  of  ghosts,  a  place 
of  living  spectres.  I  went  to  it  alone. 
Any  companion,  however  dreary,  would 
have  tarnished  the  perfection  of  the  im- 
pression Old  Cairo  and  its  Coptic  church 
can  give  to  the  lonely  traveller. 

I  descended  to  a  gigantic  door  of  palm- 
wood  which  was  set  in  an  old  brick  arch. 
This  door  upon  the  outside  was  sheeted 
with  iron.  When  it  opened,  I  left  behind 
me  the  world  I  knew,  the  world  that  be- 
longs to  us  of  to-day,  with  its  animation, 
its  impetus,  its  flashing  changes,  its  sweep- 
ing hurry  and  "  go."  I  stepped  at  once 
into,  surely,  some  mouldering  century 
long  hidden  in  the  dark  womb  of  the  for- 
gotten past.  The  door  of  palmwood 
closed,  and  I  found  myself  in  a  sort  of 
deserted  town,  of  narrow,  empty  streets, 
beetling  archways,  tall  houses  built  of 
grey  bricks,  which  looked  as  if  they  had 


260  OLD    CAIRO 

turned  gradually  grey,  as  hair  does  on  an 
aged  head.  Very,  very  tall  were  these 
houses.  They  all  appeared  horribly,  al- 
most indecently,  old.  As  I  stood  and 
stared  at  them,  I  remembered  a  story  of 
a  Russian  friend  of  mine,  a  landed  pro- 
prietor, on  whose  country  estate  dwelt  a 
peasant  woman  who  lived  to  be  over  a 
hundred.  Each  year  when  he  came  from 
Petersburg,  this  old  woman  arrived  to  sa- 
lute him.  At  last  she  was  a  hundred  and 
four,  and,  when  he  left  his  estate  for  the 
winter,  she  bade  him  good-bye  for  ever. 
For  ever!  But,  lo!  the  next  year  there 
she  still  was — one  hundred  and  five  years 
old,  deeply  ashamed  and  full  of  apologies 
for  being  still  alive.  "  I  cannot  help  it," 
she  said.  "  I  ought  no  longer  to  be  here, 
but  it  seems  I  do  not  know  anything.  I 
do  not  know  even  how  to  die !  "  The  grey, 
tall  houses  of  Old  Cairo  do  not  know  how 
to  die.  So  there  they  stand,  showing  their 
haggard  f agades,  which  are  broken  by  pro- 
truding, worm-eaten,  wooden  lattices  not 


OLD   CAIRO  261 

unlike  the  shaggy,  protuberant  eyebrows 
which  sometimes  sprout  above  bleared 
eyes  that  have  seen  too  much.  No  one 
looked  out  from  these  lattices.  Was 
there,  could  there  be,  any  life  behind 
them?  Did  they  conceal  harems  of  cen- 
tenarian women  with  wrinkled  faces,  and 
corrugated  necks  and  hands?  Here  and 
there  drooped  down  a  string  terminating 
in  a  lamp  covered  with  minute  dust,  that 
wavered  in  the  wintry  wind  which  stole 
tremulously  between  the  houses.  And  the 
houses  seemed  to  be  leaning  forward,  as 
if  they  were  fain  to  touch  each  other  and 
leave  no  place  for  the  wind,  as  if  they 
would  blot  out  the  exiguous  alleys  so  that 
no  life  should  ever  venture  to  stir  through 
them  again.  Did  the  eyes  of  the  Virgin 
Mary,  did  the  baby  eyes  of  the  Christ 
Child,  ever  gaze  upon  these  buildings? 
One  could  almost  believe  it.  One  could 
almost  believe  that  already  these  build- 
ings were  there  when,  fleeing  from 
the  wrath  of  Herod,  Mother  and  Child 


262  OLD    CAIRO 

sought  the  shelter  of  the  crypt  of  Abu 
Sargah. 

I  went  on,  walking  with  precaution, 
and  presently  I  saw  a  man.  He  was  sit- 
ting collapsed  beneath  an  archway,  and 
he  looked  older  than  the  world.  He  was 
clad  in  what  seemed  like  a  sort  of  cataract 
of  multi-coloured  rags.  An  enormous 
white  beard  flowed  down  over  his 
shrunken  breast.  His  face  was  a  mass 
of  yellow  wrinkles.  His  eyes  were  closed. 
His  yellow  fingers  were  twined  about  a 
wooden  staff.  Above  his  head  was  drawn 
a  patched  hood.  Was  he  alive  or  dead? 
I  could  not  tell,  and  I  passed  him  on  tip- 
toe. And  going  always  with  precaution 
between  the  tall,  grey  houses  and  beneath 
the  lowering  arches,  I  came  at  last  to  the 
Coptic  church. 

Near  it,  in  the  street,  were  several 
Copts — large,  fat,  yellow-skinned,  appar- 
ently sleeping,  in  attitudes  that  made  them 
look  like  bundles.  I  woke  one  up,  and 
asked  to  see  the  church.  He  stared, 


OLD    CAIRO  263 

changed  slowly  from  a  bundle  to  a  stand- 
ing man,  went  away  and  presently,  return- 
ing with  a  key  and  a  pale,  intelligent- 
looking  youth,  admitted  me  into  one  of 
the  strangest  buildings  it  was  ever  my 
lot  to  enter. 

The  average  Coptic  church  is  far  less 
fascinating  than  the  average  mosque,  but 
the  church  of  Abu  Sargah  is  like  no  other 
church  that  I  visited  in  Egypt.  Its  aspect 
of  hoary  age  makes  it  strangely,  almost 
thrillingly  impressive.  Now  and  then,  in 
going  about  the  world,  one  comes  across 
a  human  being,  like  the  white-bearded 
man  beneath  the  arch,  who  might  be  a 
thousand  years  old,  two  thousand,  any- 
thing, whose  appearance  suggests  that  he 
or  she,  perhaps,  was  of  the  company 
which  was  driven  out  of  Eden,  but  that 
the  expulsion  was  not  recorded.  And  now 
and  then  one  happens  upon  a  building  that 
creates  the  same  impression.  Such  a 
building  is  this  church.  It  is  known  and 
recorded  that  more  than  a  thousand  years 


264  OLD    CAIRO 

ago  it  had  a  patriarch  whose  name  was 
Shenuti;  but  it  is  supposed  to  have  been 
built  long  before  that  time,  and  parts  of 
it  look  as  if  they  had  been  set  up  at  the 
very  beginning  of  things.  The  walls  are 
dingy  and  whitewashed.  The  wooden 
roof  is  peaked,  with  many  cross-beams. 
High  up  on  the  walls  are  several  small 
square  lattices  of  wood.  The  floor  is  of 
discoloured  stone.  Everywhere  one  sees 
wood  wrought  into  lattices,  crumbling  car- 
pets that  look  almost  as  frail  and  brittle 
and  fatigued  as  wrappings  of  mummies, 
and  worn-out  matting  that  would  surely 
become  as  the  dust  if  one  set  his  feet  hard 
upon  it.  The  structure  of  the  building  is 
basilican,  and  it  contains  some  strange 
carvings  of  the  Last  Supper,  the  Nativity, 
and  St.  Demetrius.  Around  the  nave 
there  are  monolithic  columns  of  white 
marble,  and  one  column  of  the  red  and 
shining  granite  that  is  found  in  such  quan- 
tities at  Assuan.  There  are  three  altars 
in  three  chapels  facing  toward  the  East. 


OLD    CAIRO  265 

Coptic  monks  and  nuns  are  renowned  for 
their  austerity  of  life,  and  their  almost 
fierce  zeal  in  fasting  and  in  prayer,  and 
in  Coptic  churches  the  services  are  some- 
times so  long  that  the  worshippers,  who 
are  almost  perpetually  standing,  use 
crutches  for  their  support.  In  their 
churches  there  always  seems  to  me  to  be 
a  cold  and  austere  atmosphere,  far  differ- 
ent from  the  atmosphere  of  the  mosques 
or  of  any  Roman  Catholic  church.  It 
sometimes  rather  repels  me,  and  generally 
makes  me  feel  either  dull  or  sad.  But  in 
this  immensely  old  church  of  Abu  Sargah 
the  atmosphere  of  melancholy  aids  the 
imagination. 

In  Coptic  churches  there  is  generally 
a  great  deal  of  woodwork  made  into  lat- 
tices, and  into  the  screens  which  mark  the 
divisions,  usually  four,  but  occasionally 
five,  which  each  church  contains,  and 
which  are  set  apart  for  the  altar,  for  the 
priests,  singers,  and  ministrants,  for  the 
male  portion  of  the  congregation,  and  for 


266  OLD    CAIRO 

the  women,  who  sit  by  themselves.  These 
divisions,  so  different  from  the  wide  spa- 
ciousness and  airiness  of  the  mosques, 
where  only  pillars  and  columns  partly 
break  up  the  perspective,  give  to  Coptic 
buildings  an  air  of  secrecy  and  of  mys- 
tery, which,  however,  is  often  rather  re- 
pellent than  alluring.  In  the  high  wooden 
lattices  there  are  narrow  doors,  and  in  the 
division  which  contains  the  altar  the  door 
is  concealed  by  a  curtain  embroidered 
with  a  large  cross.  The  Mohammedans 
who  created  the  mosques  showed  marvel- 
lous taste.  Copts  are  often  lacking  in 
taste,  as  they  have  proved  here  and  there 
in  Abu  Sargah.  Above  one  curious  and 
unlatticed  screen,  near  to  a  matted  dais, 
droops  a  hideous  banner,  red,  purple,  and 
yellow,  with  a  white  cross.  Peeping  in, 
through  an  oblong  aperture,  one  sees  a 
sort  of  minute  circus,  in  the  form  of  a 
half-moon,  containing  a  table  with  an  ugly 
red-and-white  striped  cloth.  There  the 
Eucharist,  which  must  be  preceded  by  con- 


OLD    CAIRO  267 

fession,  is  celebrated.  The  pulpit  is  of 
rosewood,  inlaid  with  ivory  and  ebony, 
and  in  what  is  called  the  "  haikal-screen  " 
there  are  some  fine  specimens  of  carved 
ebony. 

As  I  wandered  about  over  the  tattered 
carpets  and  the  crumbling  matting,  under 
the  peaked  roof,  as  I  looked  up  at  the  flat- 
roofed  galleries,  or  examined  the  sculp- 
tures and  ivory  mosaics  that,  bleared  by 
the  passing  of  centuries,  seemed  to  be  fad- 
ing away  under  my  very  eyes,  as  upon 
every  side  I  was  confronted  by  the  hoary 
wooden  lattices  in  which  the  dust  found 
a  home  and  rested  undisturbed,  and  as  I 
thought  of  the  narrow  alleys  of  grey  and 
silent  dwellings  through  which  I  had  come 
to  this  strange  and  melancholy  "  Temple 
of  the  Father,"  I  seemed  to  feel  upon  my 
breast  the  weight  of  the  years  that  had 
passed  since  pious  hands  erected  this 
home  of  prayer  in  which  now  no  one  was 
praying.  But  I  had  yet  to  receive  an- 
other and  a  deeper  impression  of  solem- 


a68  OLD    CAIRO 

nity  and  heavy  silence.  By  a  staircase  I 
descended  to  the  crypt,  which  lies  beneath 
the  choir  of  the  church,  and  there,  sur- 
rounded by  columns  of  venerable  marble, 
beside  an  altar,  I  stood  on  the  very  spot 
where,  according  to  tradition,  the  Virgin 
Mary  soothed  the  Christ  child  to  sleep  in 
the  dark  night.  And,  as  I  stood  there,  I 
felt  that  the  tradition  was  a  true  one,  and 
that  there  indeed  had  stayed  the  wondrous 
Child  and  the  Holy  Mother  long,  how 
long  ago. 

The  pale,  intelligent  Coptic  youth,  who 
had  followed  me  everywhere,  and  who 
now  stood  like  a  statue  gazing  upon  me 
with  his  lustrous  eyes,  murmured  in  Eng- 
lish, "  This  is  a  very  good  place ;  this  most 
interestin'  place  in  Cairo." 

Certainly  it  is  a  place  one  can  never 
forget.  For  it  holds  in  its  dusty  arms — 
what?  Something  impalpable,  something 
ineffable,  something  strange  as  death, 
spectral,  cold,  yet  exciting,  something  that 
seems  to  creep  into  it  out  of  the  distant 


OLD    CAIRO  269 

past  and  to  whisper :  "  I  am  here.  I  am 
not  utterly  dead.  Still  I  have  a  voice  and 
can  murmur  to  you,  eyes  and  can  regard 
you,  a  soul  and  can,  if  only  for  a  moment, 
be  your  companion  in  this  sad,  yet  sacred, 
place." 

Contrast  is  the  salt,  the  pepper,  too,  of 
life,  and  one  of  the  great  joys  of  travel 
is  that  at  will  one  can  command  contrast. 
From  silence  one  can  plunge  into  noise, 
from  stillness  one  can  hasten  to  move- 
ment, from  the  strangeness  and  the  won- 
der of  the  antique  past  one  can  step  into 
the  brilliance,  the  gaiety,  the  vivid  anima- 
tion of  the  present.  From  Babylon  one 
can  go  to  Bulak ;  and  on  to  Bab  Zouweleh, 
with  its  crying  children,  its  veiled  women, 
its  cake-sellers,  its  fruiterers,  its  tur- 
baned  Ethiopians,  its  black  Nubians,  and 
almost  fair  Egyptians;  one  can  visit  the 
bazaars,  or  on  a  market  morning  spend 
an  hour  at  Shareh-el-Gamaleyeh,  watch- 
ing the  disdainful  camels  pass,  soft- 
footed,  along  the  shadowy  streets,  and 


270  OLD    CAIRO 

the  flat-nosed  African  negroes,  with  their 
almost  purple-black  skins,  their  bulging 
eyes,  in  which  yellow  lights  are  caught, 
and  their  huge  hands  with  turned-back 
thumbs,  count  their  gains,  or  yell  their 
disappointment  over  a  bargain  from 
which  they  have  come  out  not  victors,  but 
vanquished.  If  in  Cairo  there  are  melan- 
choly, and  silence,  and  antiquity,  in  Cairo 
may  be  found  also  places  of  intense  ani- 
mation, of  almost  frantic  bustle,  of  up- 
roar that  cries  to  heaven.  To  Bulak  still 
come  the  high-prowed  boats  of  the  Nile, 
with  striped  sails  bellying  before  a  fair 
wind,  to  unload  their  merchandise.  From 
the  Delta  they  bring  thousands  of  pan- 
niers of  fruit,  and  from  Upper  Egypt  and 
from  Nubia  all  manner  of  strange  and 
precious  things  which  are  absorbed  into 
the  great  bazaars  of  the  city,  and  are  sold 
to  many  a  traveller  at  prices  which,  to  put 
it  mildly,  bring  to  the  sellers  a  good  re- 
turn. For  in  Egypt  if  one  leaves  his 
heart,  he  leaves  also  not  seldom  his  skin. 


OLD    CAIRO  271 

The  goblin  men  of  the  great  goblin  mar- 
ket of  Cairo  take  all,  and  remain  unsatis- 
fied and  calling  for  more.  I  said,  in  a 
former  chapter,  that  no  fierce  demands 
for  money  fell  upon  my  ears.  But  I  con- 
fess, when  I  said  it,  that  I  had  forgotten 
certain  bazaars  of  Cairo. 

But  what  matters  it?  He  who  has 
drunk  Nile  water  must  return.  The 
golden  country  calls  him;  the  mosques 
with  their  marble  columns,  their  blue  tiles, 
their  stern- faced  worshippers ;  the  narrow 
streets  with  their  tall  houses,  their  lat- 
ticed windows,  their  peeping  eyes  looking 
down  on  the  life  that  flows  beneath  and 
can  never  be  truly  tasted;  the  Pyramids 
with  their  bases  in  the  sand  and  their 
pointed  summits  somewhere  near  the 
stars ;  the  Sphinx  with  its  face  that  is  like 
the  enigma  of  human  life;  the  great  river 
that  flows  by  the  tombs  and  the  temples; 
the  great  desert  that  girdles  it  with  a 
golden  girdle. 

Egypt  calls — even  across  the  space  of 


272  OLD   CAIRO 

the  world;  and  across  the  space  of  the 
world  he  who  knows  it  is  ready  to  come, 
obedient  to  its  summons,  because  in  thrall 
to  the  eternal  fascination  of  the  "  land  of 
sand,  and  ruins,  and  gold  " ;  the  land  of 
the  charmed  serpent,  the  land  of  the  after- 
glow, that  may  fade  away  from  the  sky 
above  the  mountains  of  Libya,  but  that 
fades  never  from  the  memory  of  one  who 
has  seen  it  from  the  base  of  some  great 
column,  or  the  top  of  some  mighty  pylon ; 
the  land  that  has  a  spell — wonderful, 
beautiful  Egypt. 


END. 


ilONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


